Happy birthday to Melba Moore, born October 29, 1945.
Depending on what page you turn to in the story of Melba Moore, you might get a completely different impression of the artist.
Turn to the mid-’60s and you’ll find her backing up Dionne Warwick and Aretha Franklin. Towards the end of that decade, she’s replacing Diane Keaton in Hair, and a few years later she’s taking home a Best Supporting Actress Tony Award for her role of Lutibelle in Purlie. Signed to Mercury then Buddah, Melba Moore is garnering club play by the late-’70s with hits like “You Stepped Into My Life” and “Pick Me Up, I’ll Dance.” Fast forward to the R&B charts in the middle of the 1980’s and her name is liberally dotting the page while also surfacing on the ballot for a Grammy nomination: “Best Rock (yes, you read correct) Performance, Female” for “Read My Lips.” Turn the television on and there she is on her sitcom, Melba and appearing in the Ellis Island (1984) miniseries. At the dawn of the 1990’s, she’s rebounding from welfare only to emerge as a successful gospel artist while revisiting her stage roots in Les Miserables, Chicago, and her one one-woman show, Sweet Songs of the Soul (now titled Still Standing)… READ FULL BIOGRAPHY
