BUDDY GUY

Born: George Guy; Lettsworth, Louisiana, 30 July 1936

Genre: Blues

Best-selling album since 1990: Damn Right, I've Got the Blues (1991)

Effervescent guitarist/vocalist Buddy Guy is a post–World War II blues pioneer who helped move blues into the electric guitar era, ultimately opening the door for the rock/blues explosion of the 1970s. One of the few remaining players with lineage to Chicago's blues heyday, Guy is an energetic ambassador who generously passes his music's culture down to others just as older blues-men passed theirs down to him. Guy's performance style is uniquely robust and many consider him the greatest living blues guitarist.

From Cotton Fields to Chicago Blues Clubs

Guy grew up in rural Louisiana. He taught himself to play guitar from listening to recordings of old bluesmen that he purchased with money he had earned from picking cotton. As a teenager, he moved to Baton Rouge and began playing gigs with local groups. He traveled to Chicago in 1957 and finally broke into the Chicago blues scene with the help of blues icon Muddy Waters who graciously took the talented guitarist under his wing. Soon Guy was in the mix with other hot blues players such as B.B. King, Otis Rush, and Magic Sam. In an effort to gain notoriety among Chicago's logjam of talented blues guitarists, Guy purchased the longest guitar chord possible—about 150 feet—and began wandering among the audience, even meandering outside the club and into the street while playing his ferocious guitar solos. Most guitarists of that time generally sat when they performed. Considered a consummate showman, Guy still incorporates the trademark guitar-playing stroll during his live shows.

On the strength of his guitar skills, Guy managed a record contract and became a notable studio musician, playing on records for many of the blues legends. He also recorded solo albums but they failed to catch the excitement generated by his live performances. In 1972 he formed an enduring musical alliance with harmonica great Junior Wells that lasted until 1993. Although blues is an American art form, Guy and most of his contemporaries went virtually unnoticed in the American music landscape, garnering much more attention overseas, particularly in London. In the 1970s, English rock/blues guitar giants Eric Clapton and Jeff Beck, in addition to the Rolling Stones, all pointed to Guy as their major influence. Clapton asserted that Guy was the best guitar player in the world. American guitar superstars Jimi Hendrix and Stevie Ray Vaughn also hailed Guy as a primary inspiration.

Acclaim and Appreciation

However, by the 1980s, Guy was having trouble securing a record label and survived mostly on the strength of his live shows. In 1990 Clapton asked Guy to perform with him at his Royal Albert Hall concerts in London. Guy's performance and appearance on Clapton's album of the concerts, 24 Nights, received enthusiastic acclaim and Silvertone Records offered Guy a recording contract. They released, Damn Right, I've Got the Blues (1991) and finally Guy was allowed to create in the studio a sound that matched the zeal of his live performances. The Grammy Award–winning album featured special guests, Clapton, Beck, and Mark Knopfler joining Guy's pleading guitar and all-out singing. Hardcore blues fans resented the rock and R&B presence on Damn Right, I've Got the Blues but Guy appreciated the long-awaited and much-deserved trip to the limelight and he intended to stay there. He released Feels Like Rain (1993), which again mixed his blues sound with a slight commercial crossover into rock and R&B. The title song is a Hendrix-like ballad, and he adds his blues touch to the pop rock "Some Kind of Wonderful." Feels Like Rain also won a Grammy Award and it features an impressive guest list that includes Bonnie Raitt, Travis Tritt, and Paul Rodgers.

Blues fans were thrilled with Guy's following recording, Slippin' (1994), because it captures, without any guest artists, his unbridled energy. The album is a good example of Guy's brand of power blues and James Brown–styled vocals.

Guy can also deliver a mellow blues, the kind of pre-electric sound associated with the Mississippi Delta. The re-released Alone and Acoustic (1991), recorded with Junior Wells and first released as Going Back in 1981, offers a dramatic contrast to his high-powered, frenzied blues. This straightforward recording displays Guy's tasteful acoustic guitar skills accompanying his more subdued vocals.

Guy enjoys promoting his music's culture to younger players and he has toured with blues-influenced musicians such as Kenny Wayne Shepherd, Susan Tedeschi, and the young blues phenomenon, Jonny Lang. He included Lang on the rocking blues release, Heavy Love (1998). Guy owns a downtown Chicago nightclub dedicated to the blues called Buddy Guy's Legends. Sweet Tea (2001), recorded in the heart of Mississippi, recreates the early blues sound and it might well be the sound Guy remembers hearing as part of the Chicago blues fraternity in the late 1950s. The album starts out with a solo acoustic lament, "Done Got Old," and the raw power of the remaining eight songs make the listener forget that Guy is past middle age. His musician friends call him an "ageless wonder" as he carries the persona of a man in his twenties. Guy's younger brother Phil Guy is also a noted Chicago blues guitar player and he often appears at Buddy's nightclub. Guy's daughter performs in the hip-hop group Infamous Syndicate.

After giving so much to so many for so many years, it is poetic justice that Guy is reaping the rewards of music stardom. He tours the world and records, enjoying his role as one of the elder statesmen of blues.

SELECTIVE DISCOGRAPHY:

Crazy Music (Chess, 1965); This Is Buddy Guy (Chess, 1968); Blues Today (Chess, 1968); Coming at You (Chess, 1968); Buddy & the Juniors (BGO, 1970); Hold That Plane (Vanguard, 1972); Live in Montreux (Evidence, 1977); Pleading the Blues (Evidence, 1979); Stone Crazy! (Alligator, 1981); DJ Play My Blues (JSP, 1982); Original Blues Brothers Live (Blue Moon, 1983); I Left My Blues in San Francisco (MCA, 1987); Live at the Checkerboard Lounge (JSP, 1988); Damn Right, I've Got the Blues (Jive, 1991); The Very Best of Buddy Guy (Rhino, 1992); My Time after Awhile (Vanguard, 1992); Feels Like Rain (Jive, 1993); Slippin' In (Jive, 1994); Buddy Guy Live! The Real Deal (Jive 1996); As Good As It Gets (Vanguard, 1998); Buddy's Blues: The Best of the JSP Sessions (Jive, 1998); Heavy Love (Jive, 1998); Sweet Tea (Jive, 2001). With Junior Wells: I Was Walking through the Woods (MCA, 1970); Buddy Guy and Junior Wells Play the Blues (Vanguard, 1972); Drinkin' TNT 'n' Smokin' Dynamite (Blind Pig, 1982); Alone & Acoustic (Alligator, 1991); Last Time Around: Live at Legends (Jive, 1998).

donald lowe