Blues legend BB mourned by music world
BLUES legend BB King, whose crisp but powerful guitar licks ranked him among the instrument’s greatest masters, has died at 89, his daughter said yesterday.
King, a towering influence over generations of musicians, still maintained a touring schedule that put to shame much younger artists until late last year when his health declined.
Daughter Patty King confirmed that the guitar master had died on Thursday night.
On May 1, he said he was entering hospice care at his home in Las Vegas.
News of King’s death elicited tributes from musicians across genres who credited the guitarist as a major force in 20th-century music.
“BB, anyone could play a thousand notes and never say what you said in one. #RIP,” a much younger star guitarist and singer, Lenny Kravitz, wrote on Twitter.
Despite his fame, King was frequently remembered for his warm and hospitable personality.
Jon Brewer, the director of a 2012 documentary on King narrated by Morgan Freeman, said he learned “so much of his kindness, generosity and sincerity as a human being” when making the film.
“His passing is truly a great loss for the music industry,” he said.
Born in poverty in Mississippi as Riley B King, the future legend learned to play a guitar that was given to him at age 12 by a plantation owner.
King later christened his trusty guitar Lucille – a reference to a brawl over a woman between two men that set off a fire though which King rushed to save his instrument.
King helped shape the modern blues, with roots in African American spirituals, that emerged fully during emancipation from slavery.
But King also managed to bring the blues to a white and international audience, setting in motion the direction of rock.
Despite his decades of recognition, his final days were clouded by unseemly scenes amid an apparent dispute between his family and manager over his care. – AFP