B. B. King

As for my band, well, my mentors were Duke Ellington, Benny Goodman, Jimmie Lunceford, and no one had a band more smartly dressed than Duke.

Once in a while, the thumb that fits over the neck of the guitar kinda bothers me a little bit, but not that much yet. I figure in time I won’t do much because of my age.

There’s a sadness to all kinds of music if you want to hear it. There’s also happiness to it if you want to hear it. Blues was started by the slaves and I think everybody thinks that it all should be sad… even some of the slaves had fun with it.

Water from the white fountain didn’t taste any better than from the black fountain.

Sometimes I just think that there are more things to be said to make the audience understand what I’m trying to do more. When I’m singing, I don’t want you to just hear the melody. I want you to relive the story, because most of the songs have pretty good storytelling.

I wanted to sustain a note like a singer. I wanted to phrase a note like a saxist. By bending the strings, by trilling my hand – and I have big fat hands – I could achieve something that approximated a vocal vibrato. I could sustain a note. I wanted to connect my guitar to human emotions. By fooling with the feedback between my amplifier and instrument, I started experimenting with sounds that expressed my feelings, whether happy or sad, bouncy or bluesy. I was looking for ways to let my guitar sing.

When you get married, your loyalty, first and foremost, is to your spouse, and to the family that you create together.

A bond as important as that of a husband and wife, is the bond between siblings.

I think when you get married, it’s not a totally free ride – it’s not without its unglamorous periods and its fights and its angry noons and silent dawns or vice-versa.

It’s like in golf… A lot of people – I don’t want this to sound trivial – but a lot of people are switching to these really long putters, very unattractive… it’s weird. You see these great players with these really long putters, because they can’t sink three-footers anymore. And, I hate it. I am a traditionalist. I have so many fabulous friends who happen to be gay, but I am a traditionalist.

You don’t have to love everything a person does to love that person.

Of all the various kinds of sexual intercourse, this has the least to recommend it. As an amusement, it is too fleeting; as an occupation, it is too wearing; as a public exhibition, there is no money in it. It is unsuited to the drawing room, and in the most cultured society it has long been banished from the social board. It has at last, in our day of progress and improvement, been degraded to brotherhood with flatulence. Among the best bred, these two arts are now indulged only in private– though by consent of the whole company, when only males are present, it is still permissible, in good society, to remove the embargo on the fundamental sigh.

I never felt I was too protective. I felt I was functioning as a dam against the river of sh*t that comes pouring down on artists, and it was a job that I took very seriously.

Without a doubt, my richest relationships are my long-term friendships with musical partners, because we make music together. That’s what we love to do with our lives.

I was lucky I always got along with girls. It was never like a big deal. I had a lot of girls that I was friends with that I wasn’t sexual with. I think having two older sisters made me comfortable like that. I just like people, so I can just go up and say whatever.

I don’t like anybody to be angry with me. I’d rather have friends.

It’s hard for a man to live with a successful woman – they seem to resent you so much. Very few men are generous enough to accept success in their women.

True friends stab you in the front.

What truly made me fall in love with Barack Obama was his character.

You know the funny thing, I don’t get along with rich people. I get along with the middle class and the poor people better than I get along with the rich people.

If I’m not interested in a woman, I’m straight-forward. Right after sex, I usually say, ‘I can’t do this anymore. Thanks for coming over!’