B. B. King

I’ve known people that was a part of a family and always feel that the family liked everyone else but them. That hurts, and that’s as deep a hurt as you can possibly get. I’ve known people that would have problems with their love life. This is kind of how blues began – out of feeling misused, mistreated. Feeling like they had nobody to turn to. Blues don’t necessarily have to be sung by a person that came from Mississippi as I did, because there are people having problems all over the world.

I was born on a plantation, and things weren’t so good. We didn’t have any money. I never thought of the word ‘poor’ ’til I got to be a man, but when you live in a house that you can always peek out of and see what kind of day it is, you’re not doing so well. And your rest room is not inside the house.

You only live but once, and when your died your done, so let the good times roll.

I never use that word, retire.

Whenever I’m in Kansas City, I think back to all the jazz-blues greats who played the blues here – like Count Basie, Charlie Parker and Jay McShann. I watched those guys jam in different places and heard a lot of things – but I couldn’t do what they did. They were too good.

Blues is a tonic for whatever ails you. I could play the blues and then not be blue anymore.

The way a band works is a metaphor for all sorts of collaborative and larger enterprises that people do.

Through Dizzy and Bird I began to learn about musical structures and the more theoretical aspects of music.

If the bass plays the root, a pianist superimposes a Maj7 built on the 5th and the sax plays the 13th, will hot women notice?

If you’ve only got one horn playing, I still want the sense of ensemble.

Finally Beiderbecke took out a silver cornet. He put it to his lips and blew a phrase. The sound came out like a girl saying ‘yes.’

Good music is good music and everything else can go to hell.

If someone thinks that peace and love are just a cliche that must have been left behind in the 60s, that’s a problem. Peace and love are eternal.

Everything I’ve ever done was out of fear of being mediocre.

Wes Montgomery played impossible things on the guitar because it was never pointed out to him that they were impossible.

Learn the tunes by playing the masters, learn expression by playing yourself.

It’s taken me all my life to learn what not to play.

The guitar is just a wonderful instrument. It’s everything: a bartender, a psychiatrist, a housewife. It’s everything, but it’s elusive.

The audience should feel they are hearing the future, arriving just on time.

Musicians don’t retire; they stop when there’s no more music in them.

I think that those elements – light and sound – are beyond democratic. They’re into the creative part of life.