![Tonya Parker Morrison]( "Tonya Parker Morrison")
Tonya Parker Morrison
March 6, 2007
The late blues guitarist Stevie Ray Vaughn once said that "without Buddy Guy, there would be no Stevie Ray Vaughn."
Vaughn wasn't the only musical mover and shaker to acknowledge George "Buddy" Guy's thunderous impact on modern music. After four decades as a seasoned bluesman, the list of artists who cite the charismatic performer as an inspiration includes everyone from Eric Clapton and Ted Nugent to country singers like Travis Tritt and Tracy Lawrence.
His early life as the son of a sharecropper outside Baton Rouge, La., held no glimpse of Guy's formidable future. He was still a young boy chipping ice to sell to his neighbors when he got his first guitar from a friend of his father's.
"He came up to me and said `I bet if I got you a guitar, you could play that thing.' Well, I was too proud to tell him I'd never done it before, so I took it and learned," says Guy.
Given the choice of picking his fingers raw in the fields or picking his fingers raw on a guitar, he chose the latter. He'd walk down to the storefronts and watch local blues players plug in their guitars and, with their old, crooked knuckles, strum out music that sent chills down his spine. There wasn't a doubt in his mind that he was witnessing a greatness that he wanted to repeat. That decision was the spark that would grow into one of the brightest fires the blues would ever know.
Once destitute, he is now the owner of Buddy Guy's Legends nightclub in Chicago and the driving force behind the Buddy Guy Foundation, which helps forgotten blues musicians with poor families get tombstones. The recipient of numerous awards (among them the W.C. Handy Award, Billboard's Century Award and three Grammy Awards), Guy considers himself "a little talented and a lot of lucky."
Although his buddy B.B. King is often given credit for Guy's resurgence, Guy credits a series of performances with Eric Clapton for helping him come back from obscurity and despair.
"He really helped people realize I was still around," Guy says of his sometimes fishing companion. "We had some legendary performances together, and it really helped me get back into people's minds. Without Eric, I don't know where I'd be."
The bright lights gleaming down on him from the stage at London's Royal Albert Hall were a far cry from his days of playing the streets for money, but there are some things even success can't erase from the memory. Hearing Guy talk about racism in the music industry is painful and sobering. While black and white may merge into one flashy blur on his trademark polka-dotted guitar, he knows that the two colors still clash all too frequently in everyday life.
"Some of the lowest points of my career have come because I am black and a blues player," he laments, his voice laced with sadness. "Because of the color of my skin and the type of music I chose to play, I always had two strikes against me from the beginning. But I didn't give up then, and I'm not going to now."
Confident, but not content, these days he's more concerned with the people that turn the screws at radio stations than nightclub owners that refused to book him in the "old days."
"I'll run into these young kids working at radio stations who would play me if they could, but the station owners just don't get it. It's really sad," he says. "They don't think the blues sells, but it's been around for too long for them to worry about stuff like that. Sure, they play the white boys, like Clapton and the Stones, who were influenced by my generation. It's thanks to them that we all still survive. Those guys help spread the word and keep the blues going."
Guy is quick to add that he is doing his best to carry on the tradition of giants like Robert Johnson, Muddy Waters, Lightin' Hopkins and too many others to name, but it's never easy. He sits in awe of what fellow musicians like Clapton, Vaughn and even newcomer Jonny Lang (who had a guest appearance on Guy's latest, "Heavy Love") have meant to the resurgence of the blues.
"Thanks to them selling so many albums, record company executives really have to stand up and take notice," he says. "They see these white musicians coming in and playing the blues and their CDs selling, and they have to snap to attention for old black guys like me."
When he’s not playing the blues and inspiring up and comers, he’s fishing. These days, of course, he’s just too busy with his legendary blues clubs, touring and recording with pals like Clapton. If only he could just get away on that fantasy fishing trip to one of his favorite holes near his Baton Rouge home, life would be about as good as it gets.
“You should come with us, girl. It’d just be you, me and Eric. We’ll teach you how to fish right!”
