Michael Bivins of New Edition fame returned to his Boston roots yesterday when the city dedicated a basketball court in his name.
Mayor Marty Walsh unveiled the sign at the newly-dedicated Michael Bivins Basketball Court. It's the very court where he grew up playing. Dribbling and shooting hoops helped save his life before his music career. Now, Beantown will invest $2 million into the court, hoping to give more Boston kids a chance at succeeding or, at the very least, keeping out of trouble.
Back home in Roxbury for the dedication, Bivins said, "I never thought I would of left the hood singing Candy Girl."
He further explained “Ball was my way out. Until I met my brothers in New Edition, ball was gonna be my way out. One way or another, I was gonna get out.”
For the unfamiliar, Michael Bivins was the founding member of Boston's LEGENDARY R&B boy band, New Edition, which also included Ricky Bell, Bobby Brown, Ronnie DeVoe, Johnny Gill, and Ralph Tresvant.
New Edition was a pioneering boy band, scoring hits with “Candy Girl,” “Cool It Now,” and “Mr. Telephone Man,” and blazing the trail for the likes of New Kids on the Block (a light-complected rip-off group also from Boston
), Boyz II Men, Backstreet Boys, and NSYNC. Bivins was also a member of Bell Biv Devoe which pioneered the new jack swing genre and was most memorable for the dance club mandatory song "Poison." He also enjoyed success discovering, managing, and producing for acts such as, Boyz II Men, Another Bad Creation, and 702, among others.
Bivins is still active in Boston and hosts an annual basketball tourney at the court at Ramsay Park which will now be named after him.
At the dedication, Bivins stated, "When the leaders came to me last year [about the basketball court], it caught me off guard. I was really dumbfounded, like, wow, there’s street names for other people, public figures like Martin Luther King Jr. and Marcus Garvey, but nobody from my city has a street sign or nothing, so this really touches me.”
He concluded, “I might just be numb. It’ll probably hit me next year when the renovation is done and they cut the ribbon and hit that light switch and the kids say, ‘Yo man, this looks nice, Mike, look at them lights.’ ”
Just for old times' sake....
Boston Strong
Black Excellence
Links:
New Edition’s Michael Bivins has a court date Thursday and Mayor Marty Walsh will be there - The Boston Globe
Michael Bivins Honored With Boston Basketball Court
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