How BB King changed the blues for us

When in New York, I went to see John Mayall and the Bluesbreakers play. Mayall, of course, is the British blues institution who started the white blues revival in the UK. He is the cradle of blues-rock guitarists whose alumni include the original Fleetwood Mac guitarist Peter Green, The Rolling Stones' guitarist Mick Taylor and Eric Clapton. He was playing in BB King Blues Club and Grill, the tony port of call for music lovers, named after the "Emperor of the Blues" - BB King - himself. What made the evening memorable for me, apart from the virtuoso performance, was that the student himself was performing in the hallowed precincts of his mentor.

"Oh, if I ever mistreated you baby

God knows I didn't mean no harm

You know, I'm just a little country boy, baby

And I was raised right down on the cotton farm".

King died a few days back, at the ripe age of 89, with his head held high. He would have passed on, a proud man; a man who broke free from the abject poverty of the cotton fields of Mississippi and walked with the kings, but without losing his common touch. Till his last breath he remained a gentleman both onstage and off.

The blues was born of despair, but King encouraged people he came in contact with to make positive choices. "Most of the time when people say blues, it's pretty negative," King told an audience. "But I'm here to tell you, blues is a label that people put on a music that was started by black people, and you can choose between the negative and the positive."

With his diligent work ethic, sharp clothes and sunny disposition, King transmogrified the blues' roughest rural elements into a cheery urbanity. Self-deprecating, but with a magisterial stage presence, a fabulous entertainer and a real human being, a refreshing sense of humour. He broke through to white audiences, particularly young rock fans, following the release of "Live at the Regal" in 1964. The album was declared a historic sound recording worthy of preservation by the Library of Congress' National Recording Registry.

And what a difference he made! He was without a doubt the most important artist the blues has ever produced. King developed a style that was both innovative and rooted in blues history. He was the blues most potent symbol, a single performer who could speak for the whole genre. He was a mentor to scores of guitarists including several marquee names. He also changed America, jettisoning racist mores on the radio and everywhere he played.

His scorching guitar licks and heartfelt vocals made him the idol of generations of musicians and fans. He played a Gibson guitar that he affectionately called Lucille with a style that included beautifully crafted single-string runs punctuated by loud chords, subtle vibratos and bent notes. His guitar could sing simply, embroider and drag out unresolved harmonic tensions to delicious extremes. It could shrink and swell with the precision of the human voice.

The result could bring chills to an audience, especially when King used it to full effect on his signature song, "The Thrill is Gone". He would make his guitar shout and cry in anguish as he told the tale of forsaken love. The crowd would hold their breath in anticipation of the denouement: "Now that it's all over, all I can do is wish you well", which he would render with a guttural flourish.

King didn't like to sing and play at the same time, so he developed a call-and-response between him and Lucille.

"Sometimes I just think that there are more things to be said, to make the audience understand what I'm trying to do more," King stated. "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."

Most unusual but very effective! King's sophisticated sensibility, world-weary voice and wailing guitar mesmerised both the musicians and the masses. For generations of blues musicians and rock 'n rollers, King's plaintive vocals and soaring guitar playing style set the standard for an art form born in the American South and honored and performed worldwide. King was the greatest upholder of a tradition that inspired everyone from Jimi Hendrix and Robert Cray to the Rolling Stones and Eric Clapton.

King enjoyed acclaim and considerable commercial success. He won innumerable awards including 15 Grammys and a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1987and the Blues Foundation Hall of Fame in 1984; received the Songwriters Hall of Fame Lifetime Achievement Award in 1990 and the Presidential Medal of Freedom; gave a guitar to Pope John Paul II and had President Obama sing along to his "Sweet Home Chicago". He performed tirelessly throughout his musical career, averaging more than 250 concerts per year into his 70s and continued to perform well into his 80s even though he had diabetes. He recorded more than 50 albums. In 2005, the Mississippi House and Senate declared February 15 to be "BB King Day".

Musicians even named a section of the guitar's neck after their blues idol, dubbing it the "BB Box". Usually located from the 10th to 12th frets, depending on the key of the song, it's where King twisted and scorched many of his signature guitar licks.

This extraordinary bluesman who sang and who could make his guitars sing was his own competition.

I attended Eric Clapton's concert in London few years back. Eric, one of King's students, had in his playing style absorbed King's musical vocabulary. The blues that he performed in the Wembley Arena would have made King's chest swell with pride. Incidentally, Eric collaborated with King on "Riding with the King," a bestseller that won a Grammy in 2000 for best traditional blues album.

Even saints, when they pass on, are sometimes denied peace. The unedifying spectacle surrounding King's death has shorn the mourning period of dignity and grace - two qualities that informed his entire life. The dramatis personae are his daughters who have accused his two closest aides of poisoning him. As a result an autopsy was performed on him. Ironically, this was the same man who preferred to take hospice care in his house, rather than be hospitalized, because he didn't want invasive medical procedure. At the center of this unseemly controversy is King's estate of millions of dollars. Greedy relatives, unscrupulous aides? Only investigations will reveal the truth but when King is buried this Saturday, he will be vastly disappointed with the discordant note in his otherwise harmonic life and legacy.

But as King himself has said, "People all over the world have problems and as long as people have problems, the blues can never die." And if blues don't die, King, the blues saint, will always keep his halo.