| Name | B.B. King |
|---|
| background | solo_singer |
|---|
| birth name | Riley King |
|---|
| alias | B.B. King |
|---|
| birth date | September 16, 1925 |
|---|
| origin | Itta Bena, Mississippi, United States |
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| instrument | Guitar, vocals, piano |
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| genre | Blues, soul blues, jazz, blues rock, electric blues, rhythm and blues, soul |
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| Occupation | Musician, singer, songwriter, record producer |
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| Years active | 1949–present |
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| Label | Geffen/Interscope/Universal, Bullet Records, RPM Records, Crown, ABC, MCA, Reprise/Warner Bros., Virgin/EMI |
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| Associated acts | Bobby Bland, Eric Clapton, Pappo |
|---|
| Website | www.bbking.com, www.bbkingmuseum.org |
|---|
| Notable instruments | Lucille
}} |
|---|
Riley B. King (born September 16, 1925), known by the stage name
B.B. King, is an American
blues guitarist and
singer-songwriter.
''Rolling Stone'' magazine ranked him at No.3 on its list of the 100 greatest guitarists of all time. According to Edward M. Komara, King "introduced a sophisticated style of soloing based on fluid string bending and shimmering vibrato that would influence virtually every electric blues guitarist that followed." King has been inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
Early life
King was born in a small cabin on a cotton plantation outside of Berclair, near
Indianola, Mississippi, to Albert King and Nora Ella Farr on September 16, 1925.
In 1930, when King was four years old, his father abandoned the family, and his mother married another man. Because Nora Ella was too poor to raise her son, King was raised by his maternal grandmother Elnora Farr in Kilmichael, Mississippi.
Over the years, B.B. has developed one of the world's most identifiable guitar styles. He borrowed from Blind Lemon Jefferson, T-Bone Walker and others, integrating his precise and complex vocal-like string bends and his left hand vibrato, both of which have become indispensable components of rock guitarist's vocabulary. His economy and phrasing has been a model for thousands of players, from Eric Clapton and George Harrison to Jeff Beck. B.B. has mixed traditional blues, jazz, swing, mainstream pop and jump into a unique sound. In B.B.'s words, "When I sing, I play in my mind; the minute I stop singing orally, I start to sing by playing Lucille."
King grew up singing in the gospel choir at Elkhorn Baptist Church in Kilmichael. At age 12, he purchased his first guitar for $15.00 although another reference indicates he was given his first guitar by his cousin, Bukka White. In 1943, King left Kilmichael to work as a tractor driver and play guitar with the Famous St. John's Quartet of Inverness, Mississippi, performing at area churches and on WGRM in Greenwood, Mississippi.
In 1946, King followed his cousin Bukka White to Memphis, Tennessee. White took him in for the next ten months. However, King shortly returned to Mississippi, where he decided to prepare himself better for the next visit, and returned to West Memphis, Arkansas, two years later in 1948. He performed on Sonny Boy Williamson's radio program on KWEM in West Memphis, Arkansas where he began to develop a local audience for his sound. King's appearances led to steady engagements at the Sixteenth Avenue Grill in West Memphis and later to a ten-minute spot on the legendary Memphis radio station WDIA. "King's Spot," became so popular, it was expanded and became the "Sepia Swing Club."
Initially he worked at the local R&B; radio station WDIA as a singer and disc jockey, where he gained the nickname "Beale Street Blues Boy", later shortened to "B.B." It was there that he first met T-Bone Walker. ''"Once I'd heard him for the first time, I knew I'd have to have [an electric guitar] myself. 'Had' to have one, short of stealing!"'', he said.
Career
1949–2005
In 1949, King began recording songs under contract with Los Angeles-based
RPM Records. Many of King's early recordings were produced by
Sam Phillips, who later founded
Sun Records. Before his RPM contract, King had debuted on
Bullet Records by issuing the single "Miss Martha King" (1949), which did not chart well. "My very first recordings [in 1949] were for a company out of Nashville called Bullet, the Bullet Record Transcription company," King recalls. "I had horns that very first session. I had
Phineas Newborn on piano; his father played drums, and his brother,
Calvin, played guitar with me. I had Tuff Green on bass,
Ben Branch on tenor sax, his brother, Thomas Branch, on trumpet, and a lady trombone player. The Newborn family were the house band at the famous Plantation Inn in West Memphis."
King assembled his own band; the B.B. King Review, under the leadership of Millard Lee. The band initially consisted of Calvin Owens and Kenneth Sands (trumpet), Lawrence Burdin (alto saxophone),
George Coleman (tenor saxophone), Floyd Newman (baritone saxophone), Millard Lee (piano),
George Joyner (bass) and Earl Forest and Ted Curry (drums). Onzie Horne was a trained musician elicited as an arranger to assist King with his compositions. By his own admission, he cannot play chords well and always relies on
improvisation. This was followed by tours across the USA with performances in major theaters in cities such as Washington, D.C., Chicago, Los Angeles, Detroit and St. Louis, as well as numerous gigs in small clubs and
juke joints of the southern US states.
In the winter of 1949, King played at a dance hall in Twist, Arkansas. In order to heat the hall, a barrel half-filled with kerosene was lit, a fairly common practice at the time. During a performance, two men began to fight, knocking over the burning barrel and sending burning fuel across the floor. The hall burst into flames, which triggered an evacuation. Once outside, King realized that he had left his guitar inside the burning building. He entered the blaze to retrieve his beloved guitar, a Gibson semi-hollow electric. Two people died in the fire. The next day, King learned that the two men were fighting over a woman named Lucille. King named that first guitar Lucille, as well as every one he owned since that near-fatal experience, as a reminder never again to do something as stupid as run into a burning building or fight over women.
King meanwhile toured the entire "Chitlin' circuit" and 1956 became a record-breaking year, with 342 concerts booked. The same year he founded his own record label, Blues Boys Kingdom, with headquarters at Beale Street in Memphis. There, among other projects, he produced artists such as Millard Lee and Levi Seabury.
In the 1950s, B.B. King became one of the most important names in R&B; music, amassing an impressive list of hits including "3 O'Clock Blues", "You Know I Love You," "Woke Up This Morning," "Please Love Me," "When My Heart Beats like a Hammer," "Whole Lotta Love," "You Upset Me Baby," "Every Day I Have the Blues", "Sneakin' Around," "Ten Long Years," "Bad Luck," "Sweet Little Angel", "On My Word of Honor," and "Please Accept My Love." In 1962, King signed to ABC-Paramount Records, which was later absorbed into MCA Records, and then his current label, Geffen Records. In November 1964, King recorded the ''Live at the Regal'' album at the Regal Theater in Chicago, Illinois.
King won a Grammy Award for a tune called "The Thrill Is Gone"; his version became a hit on both the pop and R&B; charts, which was rare during that time for an R&B; artist. It also gained the number 183 spot in ''Rolling Stone'' magazine's ''500 Greatest Songs of All Time''. He gained further visibility among rock audiences as an opening act on The Rolling Stones' 1969 American Tour. King's mainstream success continued throughout the 1970s with songs like "To Know You is to Love You" and "I Like to Live the Love".
King was inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame in 1980. In 2004 he was awarded the international Polar Music Prize, given to artists "in recognition of exceptional achievements in the creation and advancement of music."
From the 1980s onward he has continued to maintain a highly visible and active career, appearing on numerous television shows and performing 300 nights a year. In 1988, King reached a new generation of fans with the single "When Love Comes to Town", a collaborative effort between King and the Irish band U2 on their ''Rattle and Hum'' album. In 2000, King teamed up with guitarist Eric Clapton to record ''Riding With the King''. In 1998, King appeared in ''The Blues Brothers 2000'', playing the part of the lead singer of the Louisiana Gator Boys, along with Clapton, Dr. John, Koko Taylor and Bo Diddley.
2006–present: farewell tour and later activities
Aged 80 at the time, on March 29, 2006, King played at Hallam Arena in Sheffield, England. This was the first date of his United Kingdom and European farewell tour. He played this tour supported by Northern Irish guitarist
Gary Moore, with whom King had previously toured and recorded, including the song "
Since I Met You Baby". The British leg of the tour ended on April 4 with a concert at
Wembley Arena. And on June 28, 2009 King returned to
Wembley arena to end a tour around Great Britain with British blues icon
John Mayall. When questioned as to why he was embarking on another tour after already completing his farewell stint, King jokingly remarked that he had never actually said the farewell tour would be his last.
In July King went back to Europe, playing twice (July 2 and 3) in the 40th edition of the Montreux Jazz Festival and also in Zürich at the Blues at Sunset on July 14. During his show in Montreux at the Stravinski Hall he jammed with Joe Sample, Randy Crawford, David Sanborn, Gladys Knight, Lella James, Earl Thomas, Stanley Clarke, John McLaughlin, Barbara Hendricks and George Duke. The European leg of the Farewell Tour ended in Luxembourg on September 19, 2006, at the D'Coque Arena (support act: Todd Sharpville).
In November and December, King played six times in Brazil. During a press conference on November 29 in São Paulo, a journalist asked King if that would be the actual farewell tour. He answered: "One of my favorite actors is a man from Scotland named Sean Connery. Most of you know him as James Bond, 007. He made a movie called ''Never Say Never Again''."
In June 2006, King was present at a memorial of his first radio broadcast at the Three Deuces Building in Greenwood, Mississippi, where an official marker of the Mississippi Blues Trail was erected. The same month, a groundbreaking was held for a new museum, dedicated to King. in Indianola, Mississippi. The museum opened on September 13, 2008.
In late October 2006, he recorded a concert CD and DVD entitled ''B.B. King: Live'' at his B.B. King Blues Clubs in Nashville and Memphis. The four night production featured his regular B.B. King Blues Band and captured his show as he performs it nightly around the world. It was his first live performance recording in 14 years.
On July 28, 2007, King played at Eric Clapton's second Crossroads Guitar Festival with 20 other guitarists to raise money for the Crossroads Centre for addictive disorders. Performing in Chicago, he played "Paying the Cost to Be the Boss", "Rock Me Baby" and "Thrill is Gone" (although the latter was not published on the DVD release) with Robert Cray, Jimmie Vaughan and Hubert Sumlin. In a poignant moment during the live broadcast, he offered a toast to the concert's host, Eric Clapton, and also reflected upon his own life and seniority. Adding to the poignancy, the four-minute speech — which had been underlaid with a mellow chord progression by Robert Cray throughout — made a transition to an emotional rendition of "Thrill is Gone". Parts of this performance were subsequently aired in a PBS broadcast and released on the ''Crossroads II'' DVD.
Also in 2007, King accepted an invitation to contribute to ''Goin' Home: A Tribute to Fats Domino'' (Vanguard Records). With Ivan Neville's DumpstaPhunk, King contributed his version of the title song, "Goin' Home".
In 2007 King performed "One Shoe Blues" on the Sandra Boynton children's album ''Blue Moo'', accompanied by a pair of sock puppets in the video.
In June 2008, King played at the Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival in Manchester, Tennessee; he was also the final performer at the 25th annual Chicago Blues Festival on June 8, 2008, and at the Monterey Blues Festival, following Taj Mahal. Another June 2008 event was King's induction into the Hollywood Bowl Hall of Fame alongside Liza Minnelli and Sir James Galway.
In July 2008, Sirius XM Radio's Bluesville channel was re-named B.B. King's Bluesville.
On December 1, 2008, King performed at the Maryland Theater in Hagerstown, Maryland. On December 3, King and John Mayer were the closing act at the 51st Grammy Nomination Concert, playing "Let the Good Times Roll" by Louis Jordan. On December 30, 2008, King played at The Kennedy Center Honors Awards Show; his performance was in honor of actor Morgan Freeman.
thumb|European Tour 2009, Vienna, July 2009In Summer 2009 B.B. King started a European Tour with concerts in France, Germany, Belgium, Finland and Denmark.
In March 2010, King contributed to Cyndi Lauper's album ''Memphis Blues'', which was released on June 22, 2010.
King performed at the Mawazine festival in Rabat, Morocco, on May 27, 2010.
On June 25, 2011 BB King played the pyramid stage at The Glastonbury Music Festival. On the June 28 he opened his new European tour at The Royal Albert Hall, London, supported by Derek Trucks and Susan Tedeschi, Ronnie Wood, Mick Hucknall and Slash.
On December 30, 2011, B.B. King played the Fabulous Fox Theatre in Atlanta, Georgia.
Over a period of 62 years, B.B. King has played in excess of 15,000 performances.
B.B. King's Blues Club
In 1991,
B.B. King's Blues Club opened on Beale Street in Memphis, and in 1994, a second club was launched at
Universal City Walk in Los Angeles. A third club in New York City's
Times Square opened in June 2000. Two further clubs opened at
Foxwoods Casino in
Connecticut in January 2002 and another in Nashville in 2003. A club in
West Palm Beach opened in the fall of 2009 and an additional one, based in the
Mirage Hotel,
Las Vegas, is due to open in the winter of 2009.
In 2007, a B.B. King's Blues Club in Orlando opened on International Drive. The Memphis, Nashville, Orlando, West Palm Beach and Las Vegas stores are all the same Company.
Legacy
King is widely regarded as one of the most influential blues guitarists of all time, inspiring countless other
electric blues and
blues-rock guitarists such as
Jimi Hendrix,
Eric Clapton,
Buddy Guy,
Robert Cray,
Peter Green,
Derek Trucks,
Duane Allman,
Elmore James and
Stevie Ray Vaughan.
Philanthropy
In 2001, King signed on as an official supporter of
Little Kids Rock, a non-profit organization that provides free musical instruments and instruction to children in underprivileged public schools throughout the US. He sits on LKR's Honorary Board of Directors.
TV appearances
B.B. King has made guest appearances in numerous popular television shows, including ''
The Cosby Show'', ''
The Young and the Restless'', ''
General Hospital'', ''
The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air'', ''
Sesame Street'', ''
Married... with Children'', ''
Sanford and Son'', and ''
Touched by an Angel''. He has also made a cameo in the movie ''
Spies Like Us''.
Personal life
King has been married twice, to Martha Lee Denton, 1946 to 1952, and to Sue Carol Hall, 1958 to 1966. Both marriages ended because of the heavy demands made on the marriage by King's 250 performances a year. It is reported that he has fathered 15 children and as of 2004 is the grandfather to fifty grandchildren. He has lived with
Type II diabetes for over twenty years and is a high-profile spokesman in the fight against the disease, appearing in advertisements for diabetes-management products along with
American Idol season 9 contestant
Crystal Bowersox.
King is an FAA licensed Private Pilot and learned to fly in 1963 at Chicago Hammond Airport in Lansing, IL (now Lansing Municipal Airport – KIGQ). He frequently flew to gigs, but under the advice of his insurance company and manager in 1995, King was asked to fly only with another licensed pilot; and as a result, King stopped flying around age 70.
His favorite singer is Frank Sinatra. In his autobiography King speaks about how he was, and is, a "Sinatra nut" and how he went to bed every night listening to Sinatra's classic album ''In the Wee Small Hours''. King has credited Sinatra for opening doors to black entertainers who were not given the chance to play in "white-dominated" venues; Sinatra got B.B. King into the main clubs in Las Vegas during the 1960s.
Discography
Honors and awards
In 1980, he was inducted into the
Blues Hall of Fame.
In 1987, he was inducted into the
Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.
In 1990, he was awarded the
National Medal of Arts.
In 1991, he was awarded the
National Heritage Fellowship from the
NEA.
King was awarded the
Kennedy Center Honors in 1995. This is given to recognize "the lifelong accomplishments and extraordinary talents of our nation's most prestigious artists."
In 2004, the
Royal Swedish Academy of Music awarded him the
Polar Music Prize for his "significant contributions to the blues".
On December 15, 2006, President
George W. Bush awarded King the
Presidential Medal of Freedom.
On May 27, 2007, King was awarded an
honorary doctorate in music by
Brown University.
On May 14, 2008, King was presented with the
keys to the city of
Utica, New York; and on May 18, 2008, the mayor of
Portland, Maine, Edward Suslovic, declared the day "B.B. King Day" in the city. Prior to King's performance at the
Merrill Auditorium, Suslovic presented King with the keys to the city.
In 2009, ''TIME'' named B.B. King No.3 on its list of the 10 best electric guitarists of all time.
Each year during the first week in June, a B.B. King Homecoming Festival is held in
Indianola, Mississippi.
A
Mississippi Blues Trail marker was added for B.B. King, commemorating his birthplace.
On May 29, 2010, Sabrosa Park (at the small town of Sabrosa, north of Portugal) was renamed B.B. King Park in honor of King and the free concert he played before 20,000 people.
Grammy Awards
Years reflect the year in which the Grammy was awarded, for music released in the previous year.
1971: Best Male R&B; Vocal Performance for "The Thrill Is Gone".
1982: Best Ethnic or Traditional Recording for "There Must Be a Better World Somewhere".
1984: Best Traditional Blues Recording for "Blues 'n Jazz".
1986: Best Traditional Blues Recording for "My Guitar Sings the Blues".
1991: Best Traditional Blues Recording for "Live at San Quentin".
1992: Best Traditional Blues Album for "Live at the Apollo".
1994: Best Traditional Blues Album for "Blues Summit".
1997: Best Rock Instrumental Performance for "SRV Shuffle".
2000: Best Traditional Blues Album for "Blues on the Bayou".
2001: Best Traditional Blues Album for "Riding with the King".
2001: Best Pop Collaboration with Vocals for "Is You or Is You Ain't (Baby)".
2003: Best Traditional Blues Album for "A Christmas Celebration of Hope".
2003: Best Pop Instrumental Performance for "Auld Lang Syne".
2006: Best Traditional Blues Album for "80".
2009: Best Traditional Blues Album for "One Kind Favor".
King was given a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 1987.
A Grammy Hall of Fame Award was given to "The Thrill is Gone" in 1998, an award given to recordings that are at least 25 years old and that have "qualitative or historical significance."
See also
List of honorific titles in popular music
List of nicknames of blues musicians
References
External links
Official B. B. King-website
Official B. B. King Museum website
Tickets Portal of BB King
1980 Blues Foundation Hall of Fame induction
Live Photos 1 2
B. B. King's oral history video excerpts at The National Visionary Leadership Project
B. B. King biographer Charlie Sawyer writes about returning to the Delta and a "charette" on the B. B. King Museum and Delta Interpretive Center in Indianola, Mississippi
Harvard University pays tribute to B.B. King with multiple web pages and a video of a 2-hour concert honoring B.B. King at Harvard University in 2007, featuring "Monster Mike" Welch and J. Geils performing with the blues band "2120 South Michigan Avenue"
B. B. King: Number 1 Bluesman (November 22, 1969) KPFA audio documentary at archive.org.
Category:1925 births
Category:African American guitarists
Category:African American singer-songwriters
Category:American blues guitarists
Category:American blues singers
Category:American blues singer-songwriters
Category:American buskers
Category:American rhythm and blues musicians
Category:Songwriters from Mississippi
Category:Blues Hall of Fame inductees
Category:Blues musicians from Mississippi
Category:Electric blues musicians
Category:Grammy Award winners
Category:Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award winners
Category:Jammy Award winners
Category:Kennedy Center honorees
Category:Kent Records artists
Category:Lead guitarists
Category:Living people
Category:Memphis blues musicians
Category:Mississippi Blues Trail
Category:National Heritage Fellowship winners
Category:People from Leflore County, Mississippi
Category:People from Sunflower County, Mississippi
Category:People from Memphis, Tennessee
Category:Presidential Medal of Freedom recipients
Category:Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductees
Category:RPM Records artists
Category:MCA Records artists
Category:Geffen Records artists
Category:Virgin Records artists
Category:Soul-blues musicians
Category:Sun Records artists
Category:United States National Medal of Arts recipients
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