B.B. KING

WITH ALAN SCULLEY

King quickly made an impact, first landing an appearance on a radio show hosted by Sonny Boy Williamson and then getting his own show on a new station, WDIA. In addition to doing radio, he performed regularly around Memphis, and King came to be known as “Beale Street Blues Boy,” a nickname that was shortened to “Blues Boy” and then “B.B.” on the hit “When Love Comes to Town” on the group’s 1987 CD “Rattle and Hum.” Then in 2000 came King’s collaboration with guitarist Eric Clapton on the CD, “Riding with The King.” The CD became the bluesman’s first number one record and with worldwide sales of 4.5 million, the best-selling release of his long career.

90 different countries, and I think that’s one of the things that’s kind of kept us on track.”

B.B. King has been inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and the Blues Foundation Hall of Fame. He received a Presidential Medal of the Arts in 1990 and was feted in a Kennedy Center Honors ceremony in 1995.

He owns 13 Grammy awards and is widely considered among the most influential guitarists ever, with a sophisticated yet soulful and spirited sound that has not only shaped and redefined the blues, but rock and roll as well.

Despite all these honors and accomplishments, King comes across in interviews as one of the most genuinely humble stars anyone could meet. But this year, as King celebrates his 80th birthday, he’ll have a hard time denying his profound impact on blues and rock music and culture in general.

After all, it’s one thing to win awards. And it’s one thing even to be inducted into a hall of fame. But to be the subject of a museum, now that’s something that happens only to legends.

The B.B. King Museum is scheduled to open 2007 in Indianola, Mississippi, the community where King (who was born in nearby Itta Bena) spent much of his youth working in cotton fields and taking his first steps in learning to play the blues and guitar. King will be in Indianola June 10 to break ground on the first phase of the project, restoration of Mississippi’s last brick gin mill.

On May 14, 2015, the music world lost one of the true giants of blues music with the passing of B.B. King. Of course, the music King made over a career that spanned seven decades lives on. To commemorate the 10th anniversary of King’s death, here is a feature story from 2004 in which King touched on some key points in his career, showing the humility, class and kindness for which he was known.

The veteran bluesman, whose real name is Riley B. King, is understandably excited by the project.

“I’m very happy, very honored,” King said in a recent phone interview. “The city (of Indianola) is involved in what we are doing, and from what I get from the architects and everybody there, it’s a $20 million project and it should be nice.”

Plans for the museum include renovating an early brick cotton gin building as part of the museum campus – a notable component considering that King’s youth included jobs on cotton farms.

Despite the hard work of his youth, the poverty he experienced, and the upheaval King endured in his family (his parents separated when he was four and when his mother died when King was nine), he still considers Indianola home. And he wants visitors to the museum to learn about the community’s role in his life.

“I think most people like to know of my surroundings,” King said, when asked what he hoped the museum would portray.

“They like to see where I was born, see the area where grew up. All of this will be featured in the museum there, guitars and many, many things. I want the people who like me to enjoy seeing things that they have heard about or knew about through the years. And the ones that don’t know me, get a chance to know me, or know about me through the museum. Those are my thoughts on it.”

The museum will undoubtedly tell of King’s fascination with the gospel and blues and how King early in his teens started performing by playing guitar on street corners in Indianola on Saturday nights. King, though, knew he wouldn’t be able to pursue a career in blues in Indianola, and after visiting Memphis at age 20 (during which time he tracked down his mother’s cousin, Bukka White, who by then was a well-known blues artist), he moved to Memphis in 1948.

A recording contract followed in 1949, and in 1952, King enjoyed his first hit, “Three O’Clock Blues.” King began touring, fronting a band that included anywhere from 11 to 14 musicians and developing a style that blended his roots in blues with a notable element of big band swing.

But like many blues artists, King saw his audience erode during the 1960s as rock and soul music became the soundtrack for young America.

His career, though, took off again when King hired a new manager, Sidney Seidenberg, who began to promote the bluesman to white audiences who were now discovering the blues through rock artists like the Rolling Stones and Cream.

A 1968 concert at Fillmore West in San Francisco, marked a triumphant introduction for King to a rock audience, while a tour the next year with the Rolling Stones – coupled with a breakthrough hit single, “The Thrill is Gone” -- put King’s career back into high gear.

King has maintained his popularity ever since, releasing new records on a steady basis and playing about 250 shows each year. King’s career also received a boost from two more recent high-profile collaborations. A friendship with the rock group U2 led to King’s duet with the band

King cited several factors that have allowed him to enjoy such sustained popularity.

“It’s a combination of things,” he said. “I’ve had the best manager for 35 years, the best band, a great (booking) agency, ABC, and a great record company, MCA. But I think one of the things that helped me mostly was my traveling. People tease me about it, how much traveling I do, where I go, how much and all of that.

“I have found that one of the things that has helped B.B. King is taking the music to the people,” he said. “So that’s one of the reasons I’ve traveled a lot, because I notice when I go places, get letters. I get letters by the mail. Also, the record sales pick up. So, learned that early in my career. And I’ve played now

In recent years, several of King’s albums have fulfilled some of his long-time ambitions. In 1999, he released “Let the Good Times Roll,” a CD dedicated to the music of Louis Jordan. Two years later came “A Christmas Celebration of Hope,” a holiday CD that netted King two Grammy awards.

King’s latest release, “Reflections,” was another labor of love. It features King, frequently backed by a full orchestra, putting his distinctive stylistic stamp on some of his favorite songs from the R&B and pop fields, including “What A Wonderful World,” “(I Love You) For Sentimental Reasons” “Exactly Like You” (a song popularized by Nina Simone) and I’ll String Along With You” (a tune that has been covered by both Doris Day and Diana Krall).

“I’ve wanted to do a CD like that for quite some time, but (this) was the time when I was allowed to do it,” said King, who will have a duets album out later this year. “Our company is so big, so they allot you a certain time to do something because they go all out when they release something. So, I had to wait my turn.”

While pleased overall with “Reflections,” King voiced one reservation over the CD. “I will say that did them the best that I could do at the time,” he said. “But I think in a lot of cases, wanted to sing them better than sound trying to sing them. But I’m not ashamed of it. I’m happy with what we did. “If you notice, I didn’t try to sing them, though, like the people that recorded them,” he added. “I tried to do them B.B. King. I was not trying to mimic anybody else.”

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