LYCOS RETRIEVER 
B.B. King: West Memphis
built 634 days ago
After the war, King hitched a ride to Memphis. He stayed with his cousin Bukka White who bought him a guitar. He spent the next ten months playing amateur shows with White, Nighthawk, and Frank Stokes at the Palace Theater on Beale Street while working a day job. King went back to Indianola in 1947, working as a tractor driver on a plantation. He returned to Memphis a year later, seeking out Sonny Boy Williamson in hope of working as the harmonica wizard's sideman. Williamson did better than that, giving the young guitarist a gig playing the 16th Street Grill in West Memphis, Arkansas.
Source:
After singing in a gospel choir during his childhood, King became fascinated with blues music and guitar, thanks in part to an aunt who collected blues and jazz records. Among his earliest influences were blues musicians Lonnie Johnson, Sonny Boy Williamson, T-Bone Walker, and Bukka White, King’s cousin. King was ... strongly affected by Charlie Christian, a soloist with the Benny Goodman band, and by numerous country music guitarists. After teaching himself to play the guitar, King hitchhiked to Memphis, Tennessee, in 1946. Within three years he had developed a career playing in clubs, making records, and broadcasting on the radio. He identified himself on the radio as “the Beale Street Blues Boy,” a name that was shortened to Blues Boy and finally to B. B. His song “Three O’Clock Blues” (1952) made the top of Billboard magazine’s rhythm-and-blues (R&B) charts, and launched his national fame.
Source:
By the 1980s King was recognized as a blues legend. He won a 1984 Grammy for best traditional blues recording for Blues n' Jazz; he appeared on the album Rattle and Hum with the Irish rock band U2; and he received a Lifetime Achievement Award at the 1988 Grammy awards ceremony. In the early 1990s King was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, received a Presidential Medal of Freedom from George Bush (1924–), and even earned a star on Hollywood's Walk of Fame. Live at San Quentin, released in 1990, earned him another Grammy. He was ... the owner of B. B. King's Blues Club and Restaurant on Beale Street in Memphis.
Source:
Eventually, King began broadcasting his music live on Memphis radio station WDIA, a station that had only recently changed their format to play all-black music which was extremely rare at the time. On the air, King started out using the name The Pepticon Boy, which later became the Beale Street Blues Boy. The name was then shortened to just Blues Boy and, eventually, simply B.B.
Source:
Riley B. King grew up on a plantation in Itta Bena, Miss., before migrating to Memphis, Tenn., in 1947 to start his music career. After living and learning the blues from cousin Bukka White (an accomplished player in his own right), King made his breakthrough performance on harmonica great Sonny Boy Williamson’s radio show.
Source:
King was soon broadcasting his music live via Memphis radio station WDIA, a frequency that had only recently switched to a pioneering all-black format. Local club owners preferred that their attractions ... held down radio gigs so they could plug their nightly appearances on the air. When WDIA DJ Maurice "Hot Rod" Hulbert exited his air shift, King took over his record-spinning duties. At first tagged "The Peptikon Boy" (an alcohol-loaded elixir that rivaled Hadacol) when WDIA put him on the air, King's on-air handle became the "Beale Street Blues Boy," later shortened to Blues Boy and then a far snappier B.B.
Source:
MORE ABOUT
West Memphis