Happy Birthday, Buddy Guy

Published on July 30, 2005 By Ionolast In Misc

The blues singer/guitarist whom Eric Clapton called "The best guitarist in the world" is 69 today. May he have many more.

Buddy Guy is the greatest living exponent of classic Chicago electric blues. He is a thrillingly inventive guitarist, a passionately soulful singer, and a peerless showman. In the course of a 45-year professional career, he has sold over two million albums; earned four Grammy Awards; and won nineteen W.C. Handy Blues Awards — more than any other single artist.

George "Buddy" Guy was born July 30, 1936 in Lettsworth, Louisiana. "I was so far out in the country, man. We didn’t have running water, no electric lights, no radio, and I didn’t know nothing about no electric guitar. We used to get the catalogs, like from Sears, and that’s how our mother would order our clothes. Didn’t have no stores there to buy clothes from."

Today, Buddy Guy is an internationally celebrated symbol of the living blues. The owner of the Chicago club Buddy Guy’s Legends, he continues to tour the world with his dynamic live show. On February 7, 2003 at New York’s Radio City Music Hall, Buddy Guy broke up the house in a gala "Salute to the Blues." This all-star show included B.B. King, Macy Gray, Alison Krauss, the Neville Brothers, and Aerosmith, among other artists—but "the evening seemed to belong to Buddy Guy," according to Billboard. "The night's leading figure was Buddy Guy," wrote The New York Daily News while The New York Post proclaimed "it was Buddy Guy who stole the show."
"It's the blues that keeps you young," Buddy once told Guitar Player magazine. "When you stretch that string, you're stretchin' your life."

Comments (Page 2)

Ionolast

on Aug 07, 2005

I think I misquoted Clapton. Now I think he said, "Buddy Guy is, without a doubt, the best guitarist alive."

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