B. B. King

If T-Bone Walker had been a woman, I would have asked him to marry me. I’d never heard anything like that before: single-string blues played on an electric guitar.

I could see that Bukka was born to be a bluesman, and I wondered if the same was true of me. I worried that I didn’t have his talent – or the talent of someone like Blind Lemon or T-Bone. I felt something beautiful inside Bukka’s soul. Even if I didn’t follow his style, I was moved by his sincerity. He loved telling stories, and used his blues to tell them. His blues was the book of his life. He sang about his rough times and fast time and loving times and angry times. He’d entertain at a party for two hundred people with the same enthusiasm as a party for twenty. Bukka gave it his all. His music had a consistency I admired. Like all the great bluesmen, he said, I am what I am. I wondered if I could be that steady and strong.

I thought Eric Clapton was good. He still is. Not only is he good – he’s rock’s #1 guitarist, and he plays blues better than most of us.

I tried to connect my singing voice to my guitar an’ my guitar to my singing voice. Like the two was talking to one another.

Growing up, I was taught that a man has to defend his family. When the wolf is trying to get in, you gotta stand in the doorway.

I think I’ve done the best I could have done. But I keep wanting to play better, go further. There are so many sounds I still want to make, so many things I haven’t yet done. When I was younger I thought maybe I’d reached that peak. But I’m 86 now, and if I make it through to next month, I’ll be 87. And now I know it can never be perfect, it can never be exactly what it should be, so you got to keep going further, getting better.

My neighbors always listen to very hip Jazz… whether they like it or not.

Man, as long as people want to hear Jazz, I’ll give it to them.

‘Swing’ is an adjective or a verb, not a noun. All jazz musicians should swing. There is no such thing as a ‘swing band’ in music.

Your daddy’s rich and your ma is good lookin’ So hush little baby don’t you cry.

There is no such thing as a wrong note.

Just allow your feelings to go with the music and you’ll find yourself carried along by it fairly quickly.

The louder they [the band] play the softer I sing.

The guitar and the dog, in order not to be separated from man, have submitted themselves with resignation to the worst alterations of size and appearance.

I don’t believe music can be free unless it has something to be free from.

All a musician can do is to get closer to the source.

I was not prepared to play the role of singer in the camp of the warriors

What I’m doing, I prefer to call that jazz, because it is a beautiful word – I love it.

I believe in using the entire piano as a single instrument capable of expressing every possible musical idea.

I’d take my guitar and play on the streets. A gospel song would get me a pat on the head. But a blues would get me a dime. So you see why I stuck with the blues.

I have always seen Jazz as innovative.