| Riley "B.B."
King has been called the King of the Blues, and
indeed he reigns across the decades as one of the
pre-eminent figures in the medium. He is best-known
for his distinctive single-note guitar sound, played
on a guitar that he calls "Lucille," in which he
bends strings till the notes seem to cry. It is a
style that emanates from his blues roots deep in
Mississippi while also drawing on other influences,
ranging from jazz and gospel to pop and rock.
Primary influences include guitarists include T-Bone
Walker and Charlie
Christian, who similarly hybridized jazz and
blues in a big-band context.
A gracious and articulate man, King is also known
as the foremost ambassador of the blues. It was he
who, in the postwar era (and especially the Sixties
and Seventies), took the blues from the fringes of
American music and brought it to the mainstream.
King's influence on a generation of rock and blues
guitarists - including Eric
Clapton, Mike Bloomfield and Stevie Ray
Vaughan - has been inestimable. Virtually every
modern stylist has, to some degree, been influenced
by the sweetly stinging sound of his guitar.
Born in Indianola, Mississippi, in 1925, King
moved to Memphis, Tennessee in his early twenties to
make his living playing the blues. He landed a
regular spot as a deejay and performer on radio
station WDIA, where he became known as the Beale
Street Blues Boy (hence, "B.B."). King also built a
reputation as a hot guitarist at the Beale Street
blues clubs, performing with a loose-knit group
known as the Beale Streeters (which also included
Bobby Blue Bland, a longtime friend and collaborator
of Kings). King began recording in 1949 and had his
first hit, "Three O'Clock Blues," on the RPM label
two years later. The song topped the rhythm & blues
chart for 17 weeks, and King toured nationally
behind it, performing at such venues as New York's
Apollo Theater. Other numbers that became associated
with King in the Fifties include "Sweet Black
Angel," "Rock Me Baby" and "Every Day I Have the
Blues."
See
http://www.rockhall.com/hof/inductee.asp?id=137
|
