Roy Montrell

Roy Montrell (27 February 1928, New Orleans, Louisiana - 16 March 1979, Amsterdam, The Netherlands) was a rhythm & blues guitarist.

Roy Montrell was one of the busiest sessionmen, and one of the most influential guitarists in New Orleans for more than 20 years, playing with everyone from Bobby Mitchell to Roy Milton and Lloyd Price, as well as being a fixture in Fats Domino’s band for years—along the way, he even found time to give guitar lessons to a youthful Mac Rebennack. The New Orleans answer to Steve Cropper in Memphis, Montrell was always booked somewhere on somebody’s session, with the result that in more than 20 years in music, he only ever cut two singles of his own, one for Specialty: “(Everytime I Hear) That Mellow Saxophone” and one for Minit: “Mudd.”
He played on hundreds, possibly thousands of recordings, some of them among the most famous recordings ever to come out of New Orleans—by the likes of Fats Domino, Allen Toussaint, Paul Gayten, Art Neville et al—and was also in heavy demand as a live musician, usually on tour as part of somebody’s band. He died in Amsterdam while on a concert tour of Europe.
“(Everytime I Hear) That Mellow Saxophone” has been widely covered by acts including The Stray Cats and Imelda May. It was chosen by Bob Dylan for the “Musical Instruments” episode of his Theme Time Radio Hour series and is featured on the 2-CD set of tracks from the show.