Original subtitles

That there may be a great deal of pain

that went with

a walk of four miles

and not knowing what might happen.

A night of sleeping with someone,

or near someone,

and being afraid to fully go to sleep,

because you might wake up dead,

robbed, or arrested.

So within all of this,

is the life story of survival.

But survival is a word.

This is a story.

Cut, and take your film home.

(crickets chirping) (heartbeat thumping)

(old-timey blues music)

- [Morgan] The whole progression of American music

is stemmed from that initial field holler...

That became the blues.

Blues guys, they weren't all professionals.

I remember Sunday morning blues sessions on the back porch,

the guys sitting with a bottle of gin.

Well, it wasn't a bottle of gin,

it was a jar of white lightning, singing the blues.

(train whistle blowing)

(harmonica music) - It's all about feeling.

You can play a thousand notes a minute

and it just goes straight across the board,

and there's no feeling, it doesn't mean anything.

(singing) I love her in the morning,

I love her at night.

The very next day, you know I hugged her just right.

I love my baby.

Well the blues, to all or most of us Black,

it's a feeling.

It come out of suffering.

(singing) I love my baby,

don't care a thing about me

Being denied, denial, refused,

abused, misused, that's what the blues is.

- See, a lot of times, uh, the younger people say, uh,

"That's old folks' music," the blues is.

But wait until they have a problem.

- There's no music in the world that cuts emotionally

the way that blues guitar can cut.

- Sincere, honest, true, for real and genuine...

Those five things.

If you have those five things, then you can play the blues.

Otherwise, you gonna sound like a parakeet

repeating something that you don't understand.

- He invented the whole approach that,

that modern electric blues players use.

He's the only guy, or musician of any sort,

male or female, that defines a genre of music.

- The people who follow blues music and are attracted to it,

recognize the honesty of the singer's story.

- Well, when you say blues, you gotta say B.B.,

you know, no doubt.

- He's the master.

- He really is the grand master.

(energetic blues music)

- [Morgan] What makes somebody great, somebody special?

When you look at a man's life, can you truly say,

"That man made a difference"?

People say folk are born that way,

or were blessed by a higher force.

Others say your environment makes it so.

In 1925, on a hot, sticky Wednesday

in the middle of September, the cries of a newborn baby

rang out from a sharecropper's cabin

over the cotton fields of the Mississippi Delta.

(baby crying)

A boy was born that day that was going to make a difference.

His name: Riley B. King.

(thunder booming)

- I was born, according to my dad,

between a little place called Indianola and Itta Bena.

So when I first talked about it, I said,

"Itta Bena," and that's been going on ever since.

* I walked my bedroom floor

* Hung down my head and cried

* I didn't exactly have the blues

* I just wasn't satisfied

* I need my baby, I ain't lyin'

* If I don't hurry up and find her

* you know I think I'm going out of my mind *

Mostly cotton is king in here.

Can you imagine being out there on a tractor,

and you had to go?

Those rows of cotton look like they're a mile,

a mile and a half long.

(energetic blues music)

(electric guitar solo) (audience clapping)

From what he said, uh, if I can understand him correctly,

we're about at the turn to the road.

Dad, you did all right, so far.

- [Voiceover] He must be lookin' over us, Bubba.

- Yeah, he's lookin' over us now.

(applause)

Thank you, thank you!

To be here, where somebody can truly say,

"B, this is where you were born,

"this is where the world first knew about you, right here,"

is a high for me 'cause I feel very good.

My mother was named Nora Ella.

My father was named Albert Lee.

But for a young couple that hadn't been married too long

and their first kid coming out, they lived not too far

back over here.

Some of the houses in the area where I lived at,

houses that we could look out

through the boards of the house

different times of day and tell what time it was.

(thunder booming)

When it rained, you had to have several buckets,

'cause the water would drop through the top.

You have to set a bucket to keep it

from splashing on the floor.

My mother, I guess, was like most mothers,

wanna make sure that all the teaching

and all of the guiding that they could do for you.

And I believe my mother loved me,

and I know I loved her.

And everything she tried to teach me, I tried to learn.

So finally my mother and my dad, when they were separated,

my mom left and moved to Kilmichael, Mississippi.

- I think his mother's presence

had a profound influence on him.

He obviously thought a great deal of her

and was very impacted by her loss.

- I noticed that my mother had

big spots of blood clots in her eye.

She died of diabetes,

same as her son have, this one.

* Nobody loves me but my mother

* And she could be jivin' too *

I had been living with other people

all of my life since my mom.

I think Miss Mima might have helped

take care of him when his mother passed.

And then also, I know Miss Beulah did.

- I had two or three great-aunts.

One of them was the one that used to have the phonograph

that I used to go to her, her name was Jemima.

I used to love to go to her house for that,

but didn't like to go to her house

'cause she always kissed me, and she always dipped snuff,

and I didn't like snuff.

And every time she'd kiss me, I'd get a taste of that snuff.

So I'd beg my mom, "Don't take me over there!"

Then I'd think about her phonograph.

(laughs) "It's okay, take me on over there."

Kind of fix myself for that first kiss.

After that, I didn't have to go through that again.

- He moved from there over on, uh, Edwayne Henderson place,

and that's when Riley started staying with him

on the George Bood place.

And he moved over there to stay with

his Uncle William and them to tend to the baby.

- My mother's brother was married to

a sanctified preacher's sister.

This preacher, after church on a Sunday afternoon,

would visit his sister, which was my aunt,

and he'd always lay this guitar on the bed

and I'd go get it soon as they'd turn their back.

So I think this is really what started me to fooling

with the guitar, not by listening

to some of the other people.

They'd go in and eat, which I loved to see him

because he played guitar, but I didn't like them going in

and having dinner before the rest of us

'cause nothing was left but the chicken feet.

But when I'd hear him play the guitar,

I thought that was the nicest thing ever.

And I guess that's about when I first started

payin' attention to it.

(lighthearted old-timey instrumental)

The roots, as they sometimes say,

I think my beginning was Elkhorn School.

At that time, I had to walk

about five miles a day to school.

- Four months' school did not provide much education

on the plantation.

He said, "Them big boys ought to be in the field,

"not in school."

- Well I was six years old when I started school,

but, uh, B.B. started when we was about eight.

From the first grade through the eighth,

we was all in one room.

- It was fun going to Elkhorn School because

I didn't know anything else.

I'd never been to any other school to know about it.

- Oh, he was real smart, and, uh,

he wasn't too smart in his books,

but he was smart in other things.

He was real strong with his hands.

We used to play games out there.

A game we would say, "Let Buddy, let Buddy out."

So we all would, uh, make a circle.

Everybody would hold one another's hands,

and the one in the middle would try to break out.

So I'd always make it my business to hold B.B.'s hand

'cause he could really hold your hand tight.

- Usually, I try to be positive in my thinking.

And I owe that to Professor Luther H. Henson.

He told me things then that I can still hear him

telling me today.

"Don't smoke.

"Don't drink!

"You got one house, your body.

"Your body is one house.

"You're supposed to take care of that one

"'cause you're not gonna get another one."

- I think he did it because he saw the need

of the Black children needed to be taught

how to better themselves and make a better living.

And it could be done if they would come to school

and get a better education.

- I'll always love him.

I was a regular hand from the time I was seven years old.

See, they used to didn't have no child labor laws

and all that, so I was doing farm work

just like the adults was, when I was seven.

I started about what we call from "can to can't."

"Can" means when you can see, "can't" when you cannot see.

And I think about it, when I was traveling

with the mule, following the mule plowing,

doing all that, you're walking about

30 miles a day and you do that six days a week.

So you figure it out.

And you do that six days a week.

You do it for six months out of the year.

So multiply that by 18 years.

I've walked around the world.

* Ooh Lordy, my troubles so hard

* Ooh Lordy, my troubles so hard *

- Out of that condition, the blues were born.

Usually one guy would be plowing by himself.

Or maybe one guy would, um,

take his hoe and chop way out in front of everybody else.

And usually you would hear this guy sing.

(guitar strumming)

(singing) Oh, wake up in the morning

- That's the only time you'd get a chance

to sing the blues is out in the field,

because your parents didn't allow that in the house.

Nothing but spirituals.

So if you picking cotton you can sing

whatever you want to sing, you know?

- To play that music and not invoke

the name of Jesus, or God, I guess,

then who are you invoking?

The devil.

- People who are religious did not take kindly to people

playing the blues, which they thought was not...

Well, like you say, it was the devil's music.

- I don't know about all of that, but that's what

they would call it.

They said, "Sellin' yourself to the devil."

- A lot of people in the church, they go through this thing

that it's the Devil's music, but...

The way he plays and the way he sings,

that is a gift from God.

And if you are at all religious, you will believe

that he has that gift, and that he was touched when,

when he was, you know, in the womb.

(gospel-style singing)

* Somebody calling my name *

- You were John, Jim, Jones,

and nobody all the week long,

but Sunday morning you became Brother John, Sister Mary,

and Mr. Jim because you were somebody Sunday morning.

Well, if it had not been for that,

we would have gone out like a light.

- My mother was very religious, very, very religious.

She made me go to church, whether I wanted to or not.

- When he joined the church, well, Archie was a preacher.

My brother-in-law was a preacher.

He preached his church out.

- Reverend Archie Fair was our pastor,

and the first person I ever heard play electric guitar.

That's why I wanted to be like him.

- In the church, this boy would get a chance

to play on Archie's guitar a little.

- He was a preacher and a teacher.

And I think that he didn't necessarily just

meant for it to be me, but all of his students.

And I liked him, worshiped him.

And I think that's how he helped me a whole lot.

- Well, when his grandmother moved over there,

William decided that he wanted him to stay

with his grandmother,

so he put him down there with her.

- And she would work for my mother and them.

She would cook, and she'd clean house,

just anything she needed to do, you know.

And, uh, they probably worked in the fields, too.

When my grandmother died, I still stayed

in the little house that my grandmother and I

had lived in before she died.

* Yes, it had to happen

* I'm not surprised *

And I remember she owed something like $35, $40,

or something, but we didn't make much money.

I was making $15 a month, so...

But I paid my grandmother's bill.

I paid it off myself.

- It's safe to say that he was traumatized

and probably quite stunned.

After all, he didn't know where his father was.

His mother'd been dead some years.

His grandmother just died.

And he lived alone, at age 14.

- I felt deserted.

Nobody but me.

* How I'll survive *

After my daddy got me and brought me to

Lexington, Mississippi, and I started

to going to school there, which was the first

big school I'd ever gone to.

- Well, he see he had some half-sisters and brothers,

and he said that they couldn't get along too good.

That's what he told us.

- He had three girls and a boy,

and those was my sisters and brother, and which I loved,

but I wasn't as close to them as I think I would have been

had I been raised with them in the beginning.

My dad never told me he loved me,

never did.

But I knew when he did.

When he showed love to me, he called me "Jack."

Now, why in the heck did he call me Jack?

But anytime he was very pleased or had that feeling,

he'd call me Jack out of the clear blue sky.

"Jack, what do you think about this?"

Or, "What do you think about that?"

And I'd feel so good 'til I'd almost cry,

'cause I knew what that meant.

But he never, ever, ever, ever, that I know,

called or said, "Son, I love you, I love you."

But I tell my kids, great-grandkids and grandkids,

tell them all when I go home, "I love you."

(laid-back instrumental music)

- In those days, it was oppression,

and you'd be depressed by the oppression

because you had no rights.

Black folk had no rights.

You were not Black then, you were Negroes or niggers.

- Ku Klux Klan was thought of, I believe,

in that area at the time.

I never did come face to face with them,

but I knew a lot of people did.

For you that don't know it, this citizen council,

white citizen council, began in

Indianola, Mississippi, my home.

- Our place was to work hard

and obey the white man.

- One of my first days of really experiencing what

segregation was really like,

a mob had killed a boy, they'd hung him.

It had to do with a white lady.

They had castrated him and drug him behind the car

to the courthouse in Lexington, Mississippi,

Lexington.

And I saw it.

And that's something I've never forgotten.

I guess it's something like people seeing people

killed in the war, you don't forget it.

- You were just a thing.

Not a human being, just a work thing.

It had a slogan:

"If a mule die, buy another one."

- "Kill a nigger, hire another one."

And that's the way I was brought up.

- And it meant you were nobody.

You just about equal to a mule.

You could not say "yes" or "no" to a white man.

It was "Mister."

And you just didn't argue with them.

And whatever they paid you,

you accepted that and went along.

There was no such thing as Social Security,

no such thing as retirement.

You had no insurance, only insurance folks had

was burial insurance when you die,

otherwise, they would put you in a box.

They had a box, they'd make a box,

put you in and bury you.

Well, I was there, I know!

It was badder than bad.

- I've always been aware that I was Black in a white world,

but I also had the feeling that

somehow I would overcome that.

And I think that is one of the things

that always drove B.B.,

that somehow he had to overcome that.

We all were a subject of racism,

and bigotry, and hatred, and denial.

None of us could get a drink of water

at a public water fountain.

None of, B.B. and none of the rest of us,

could go and sit in a restaurant and have a decent meal.

None of us could stay at, B.B., nor I, no other Negro

could go in the hotel and get a room.

So yes, he faced the same thing that all of us faced.

That was racism, bigotry, and hatred.

But let me add this, though.

Let me say this to you about B.B.

He never let that turn him against white people.

- [Morgan] Young Riley King started dreaming of life

back in the Delta.

The Delta was home.

So late in 1941, 16-year-old Riley jumped on his bicycle

and began to pedal his way home,

back to where his heart belonged.

- Well he rode a bicycle from his daddy's home in Lexington,

and, uh, it's about 50 miles is how far it is.

(laughing)

- He was raggedy when he came to my house from Lexington.

He didn't have no clothes and things.

- I finally made it into Kilmichael,

and believe it or not, the axle on my

bicycle had worn out, so it broke.

- So me and John were sitting on the porch one evening,

and here he come riding on his bike,

and I said, "Who is that?"

And he said, "I don't know."

And he got up a little closer, I said "Oh, that's Riley."

But see, all his other people had left here.

- But there was a few people, like the Fairs,

Mr. John Fair and his beautiful wife,

Miss Leslie Fair.

- John told him, said, "Now, when y'all

get through riding around and all,

when you get ready to go to bed,"

said, "just come on back here at the house."

- John brought him to my father and uh,

to give him a place to stay.

So he fixed that little cabin up for him.

And he didn't have any clothes.

All he had was just the, um,

clothes on his back, and that bicycle.

- I had a good boss.

Mr. Cartledge was one of those people

that I wish the world had a lot more of 'em.

He seemed to be one of them people that was

a fair man.

During those days, in the 30s, a lot of times

we didn't think a lot of white people was fair.

We thought a lot of the white people at that time,

thought only of themselves.

But he wasn't one of those people.

- B.B. was talented, he could do a good job.

He could cut wood.

He could plow.

He could do best anything, pick cotton,

excellent cotton picker.

- The house stood about here,

where B.B. lived when he lived with

Flake and Zelma Cartledge and their son, Wayne.

- I do remember that he, uh,

he had always wanted to play a guitar.

And a fellow, the name of Denzel Tibble,

had a guitar he wanted to sell for $15.

And I,

my father went down there and paid for it for him

and B.B. paid my father back, you see.

- You may not know that Wayne wanted his daddy

to buy the guitar for him and he wouldn't do it.

And B.B. was the one that ended up with the guitar.

- And I'm still mad about I didn't get a guitar.

(upbeat old-timey band music)

(old-timey jazz music)

- When I first came to the Barrett Plantation,

I'd heard a lot about the plantation

and heard a lot from a lot of the,

the tenants that lived on the plantation

about what a nice man he was to work for.

- B.B. used to be my tractor driver.

He drove tractor for Mr. Barrett, B.B. did.

- There was many big plantations,

and they would have somebody they call a rider.

Usually it was a white person on a horse.

This white person usually carried a gun,

in a lot of cases.

A lot of cases, he carried a whip.

Mr. Barrett was very, I don't know,

very thoughtful, I would say.

So what he did, he hired a Black overseer

named Mr. Baggett, Booker Baggett,

and we worked like crazy because we wanted to keep him.

And Mr. Baggett is the one that taught me to drive tractor.

If there's any such thing as a superstar in tractors,

I thought I was.

Of course, I thought I was pretty cute too, at the time.

I'd wake up, and I'm due at the tractor barn

in about half an hour.

And I lived about a mile from the tractor barn.

So when I'd wake up, having about 30,

40 minutes to get to the tractor barn,

I'd put on my clothes and was at the tractor barn

by the time everybody else was ready to fill up.

- (singing) Precious Lord, take my hand

Lead me on, let me stand.

- My early years, I sang gospel songs

with various quartets, and usually I was

the lead singer all the time.

And we did very well.

There was a group called:

- The Famous St. John Gospel Singers.

- Famous St. John Gospel Singers.

- The St. John Gospel Singers were an upbeat.

Brother John was the, uh, president of the group.

Another brother, Orwell, the baby brother

was singing with them.

Birkett Davis, who was the cousin who was singing with them.

And Riley was the guitar player, and that set them apart.

Plus the fact that he had a very good voice.

They had some good voices in the quartet.

- Had a good time listening at it.

I get home, I know what to do.

Turn the radio on, sit there and wait on them to come on.

Sure did.

- Then is the time that I decided I wanted to get married.

And I got married to a young lady.

- To Martha King.

In that year, we lived in the house together.

We lived in a three-room, shotgun house.

Two doors, one in front and one in back.

- But Martha and B.B. married,

they never did have no children.

He was singing gospel songs then.

He didn't stay at home much with her.

He didn't stay at home, but he was running around

singing a whole lot.

- On weekends, then B.B. would just decide

he would go to town and play.

And people'd give him a great offering in town.

- Saturdays was my day.

Go to town on Saturdays and have a good time.

* Yeah, if you ever been down to New Orleans

* Then you can understand just what I mean

* Now, all through the week *

- [Annie] Some walked to town.

Some would catch a ride.

One person might have a car.

And people used to come to town then in wagons.

- [David] Everybody threw their cares to the wind.

Church Street was Black folks' street.

* It was rockin'

* It was rockin' *

People were in and out, gambling and doing what little

dancing they were doing.

If you didn't get on Church Street,

you wouldn't be in Indianola.

- And they would get after him about it.

Say, "Hey, you can't sing in St. John Gospel Singers

and sing the blues on the corner Saturday nights."

(laughing)

- He had one corner he would play on

early during Saturday afternoon, and would put his hat out

and people would throw coins in it.

Later on during that Saturday evening

when he would move further down Church Street,

where the real roughnecks were and the people

who had a real appreciation for the blues

and didn't mind people knowing it,

they threw just a little more coins in the hat

than the earlier crowd, which

probably were the church-going people.

- Now, he used to play on what they called, you know,

"juke houses," porches, all the way down Church Street.

That's what used to be, I reckon you would call,

wouldn't call them night clubs, but juke joints would be

that time of year then.

(lively band music)

- Indianola, Mississippi on a Saturday night

on Church Street...

You would remember it forever (laughs).

I came in, in a hurry, on my way to go

to a church to sing that night.

I'd been plowing, plowing, plowing.

And then it happened.

We got off that evening.

I cut this ignition off of the tractor.

And I jumped down and start running to get ready

to go out, and it started up again.

And when the tractor started up again,

it went forward.

And all of this broke off.

Scared me half to death.

I never did stop running, and that's the first time

I went to Memphis.

* And now I'm walking

* walking and crying

* You don't love me no more

*Well, I did it all for you

* Did all I could

* All I did, darling *

Memphis was the city,

I would say it was like heaven.

(laughing)

All them guitars, and guys could play them?

Oh, what a feeling it was.

- Beale Street had many musicians that was interested in

trying to help you if you wanted to learn.

And they had musicians

that would just meet up on Beale Street,

like, on the weekends, and trade ideas.

- I came to Memphis and started hearing

all those other guys play.

I found out I wasn't nothing, not much.

I'm still like that today.

* And there's two little women,

* boys, I ain't never seen

* Pretty two little pretty women,

* they's from New Orleans

- [Morgan] Once in Memphis, B.B. King sought

and found his cousin,

the great bluesman Bukka White.

- Bukka was born up around West Point, Mississippi.

And a lot of people say he taught me to play,

but that's not true.

But he did teach me quite a bit about being a blues player.

Bukka White used to tell me that to be a blues singer,

you should always dress like you was trying to go

to the bank to borrow money, which mean you dress,

well, a word musicians use, kind of "sharp," you know.

Even if you was casual, you look clean,

not like you slept under the Mississippi Bridge

last night.

But this is the kind of guitar that he played.

And he used to play with a slide on his finger.

And I could never get that.

Well, I've got stupid fingers, they just wouldn't work.

So in order to get somewhat

the type sound that he had,

I would trill my hand.

(guitar twangs) Like that.

And I think over the years I've done pretty good with it.

(guitar twangs) Still don't have it right.

- I asked B.B., one time, how he got his

guitar to sound that way and he said,

"I was trying to make it sound like a steel."

So who would have thought?

(lively band music)

- [B.B.] Beale Street Amateurs.

I hosted the show for 11 consecutive years.

- At first, you used to have a $5, $3, and $2 prize.

But then it got so that it was just everybody

that came on stage got a dollar.

- Get on the Amateur Show and you could win $5,

if you had the best song, or the best voice, or whatever.

- Now, I remember going on that show many times.

And thank God for Rufus Thomas, because (laughs)

Rufus Thomas was the emcee.

I guess I looked so bad, and so pitiful,

and was so broke (laughs),

Rufus Thomas, when he would see me, he'd say,

"You know you was on last week."

I'd say, "Yeah."

"Well, why you back this week?"

"I need to go on again 'cause I need that dollar."

- That dollar that he got, with the bus fare being a nickel,

it could last him just about a whole week.

- A lot of times he would put me back on again,

and he did that many times.

So, Rufus, thank you.

I stayed up there for about six or eight months.

And then I called some of my family back and I said,

"Tell Mr. Barrett I'm sorry,

"and I would like to work and pay it off."

- So he got back in with Mr. Johnson Barrett

and came back and worked by the day driving tractors.

- Mr. Barrett said, "It's okay.

"I'm not angry with you, come on in."

Well, with wobbly legs, I came back.

And I think it cost, like, $500 or $600,

and I paid it off.

And the next time I left to go to Memphis

and start my career, I started it correctly.

* Whoa, Lord, what a beautiful city

* Oh, what a beautiful city, God knows

When we left Mississippi going to Memphis,

we expected many, many things to happen,

and it did.

The late Sonny Boy, the second Sonny Boy Williamson,

well, he was on the radio in West Memphis, Arkansas.

I decided I wanted to go and see him one day.

And one day I did.

And when I went over to see him,

I begged him to let me sing a song.

So he made me audition and I did,

and he liked it, and he put me on his show that day.

And that night, he had two jobs to play.

One of them he didn't want because

it didn't pay much money.

So he called the lady, and he asked the lady

that he was supposed to play for

did she hear the program?

And she said, "Yes."

So he called her and he said,

"Miss Annie, did you hear the boy?"

And she said, "Yeah."

He said, "Well, I'm gon' send him down

to work for me tonight."

So I went over there, man, and they paid me $12,

12 American dollars.

That's a lot of bread, you know,

for a guy that'd been making, you know,

like, 35 cent a hundred picking cotton, you know?

She said, "If you can get a job on the radio,

like Sonny Boy has, I'll give you this job,

and you can play six nights a week."

And I thought about that, and said,

"God, I hope I can get me a job on the radio."

Well I'm just a blues singer,

tractor driver, truck driver.

I was a disc jockey for a while.

Why I sing the blues is because I lived it.

You probably wonder, "That guy,

"the way you talk, you're a disc jockey?"

Trust me, I was, for about five years.

The only way to do it is say it loud and clear.

Make sure that everyone will hear.

It's the truth the way it is.

And I enjoyed it so much that the call letters

of the radio station

I can remember today like it was yesterday.

This is B.B. King making a statement

and a natural fact.

WDIA.

Everybody wanna know why I sing the blues.

The first all-Black operated station in the mid-South.

In fact, I think in the nation.

(radio dial tuning)

- Greetings and salutations!

Ooh-boopy-doo, and how do you do?

It's a good, good morning to you on an all-blues Saturday,

here on WDIA with your Rufus Thomas.

- This new radio station was being opened in Memphis.

So when the red light went off the air,

I went to the window and I knocked.

(knocking)

So he came to the door and said,

"What can I do for you, young fella?"

And I said, "Well, I wanna make a record,

"and I want to go on the radio."

And he laughed.

Mr. Ferguson said, "Well, we don't make records."

And then he had this deep look, thought look in his face.

And then he said to Mr. William, he said,

"You know, we got this new product."

Said, "Maybe he would he would be good

"for this new product."

So he went and got me a bottle.

And he held it up like this.

He said, "This is Pep-ti-kon.

"Do you think you could write a jingle for it?"

I started to thinking about it.

I say, "Yes, sir, I can write a jingle."

So it went like this:

(clapping)

(singing) Pep-ti-kon sure is good

Pep-ti-kon sure is good

Pep-ti-kon sure is good, you can get it anywhere

in your neighborhood.

He said, "You're hired."

(laughing)

(electric guitar solo)

- [Voiceover] "Blues Boy" King.

Blues Boy, who, did your dad name you that?

- No, I used to be a disc jockey in Memphis.

And, uh, they called me "The Boy from Beale Street,

"the Blues Boy."

So people, instead of saying "Blues Boy,"

they just started using the word "B.B.,"

which meant "Blues Boy".

And my real name is Riley B. King.

Now most times if someone would come up and say,

"Hi, Riley", I would wonder who they're talking about.

If I was gonna think about hiring a musician,

I usually think of it in terms of this:

About 75% man first, you know, gentleman,

and 25% musician, because I feel that in time

if you get to be 50/50, then this is good.

But if you're just a good guy,

I can tolerate the other part.

- I taught him the best I could.

A lot of times he didn't understand

what I was telling him.

But when I put him with a group,

that put pressure on him and he had to learn.

You can't work with nobody without you knowing.

You see where the bass player is right now?

When you see B.B. playing,

the bass player is right behind him.

That's what he listens to.

Now he know.

- In fact, it's like I've usually told the band

like I have today, "You know a lot more than I do.

"And you play better than I do.

"But I'm the bandleader."

- B.B. was just learning how to play.

But he always could sing,

and he finally learned how to play.

(record loading)

(B.B. King guitar music)

- [Morgan] Having learned from those around him,

the young and confident Riley King was ready

to cut his first sides.

- B.B. King first recorded for Bullet Records

in Nashville, Tennessee.

Jim Bullet owned the company.

I think he had four sides he did.

- He did a thing for his first wife, Martha King.

In fact, the song was recorded "Martha King."

- I thought I was really making it,

at that time, as a musician 'cause I was recording!

* I ain't afraid to call her name *

- We operated jukeboxes in Los Angeles

on Central Avenue, primarily, which was

the Black area of Los Angeles.

We were really short of blues records,

so that's when we started, got the idea that we'll just

have to make something for our jukeboxes.

- I made a few recordings with him, I was on piano,

at the old Sun Studio with Sam Phillips.

- Sam Phillips had a contract with us.

I'm talking about "us," Modern Records,

where we would get first choice of anything he recorded.

He'd send us out a dub of it,

and if we wanted it, we'd pay him for it.

When Chess Records got "Rocket 88"

by Ike Turner and Jackie Brenston,

it was not sent to us for,

even though we had first refusal.

That's when we severed our contract with Sam Phillips,

and I decided to come in and record B.B.

(guitar solo music)

* Now here it is three o'clock in the morning' *

- The first session that I did with B.B. in Memphis,

where "Three O'Clock Blues" was his hit

record that came out of there.

It was just put the musicians together and do it.

- I said, how big was that amplifier you had

when you made Three O'Clock in the Morning?

He said, "About like that."

And that's when you had that real, natural tone.

It wasn't nothing fictitious about it, you know.

That's exactly, what you played

is what the amplifier gave you back.

- We recorded in the Black YMCA in Memphis.

And what I had to do was put furniture blankets

over the windows because the noise from the cars

would be a little bit too noisy to record.

When I got back to California,

I listened to it and I knew we had a hit record then.

* Well, my baby can't be found

* Well, if I don't find my baby *

- When he recorded "Three O'Clock Blues,"

that's when things really began to happen for him.

- He said, "I'd like to have a new guitar,"

before we went in the studio.

I said, I'll buy you two of them.

I bought him two guitars.

That's when he called them Lucille.

And he says, "I'll make you two hit records," which he did.

- I've always wanted to meet Helen.

- Helen? Who's Helen?

- Helen, Helen, your guitar.

You know, you, when you start--

- Oh, you're talking about Lucille.

This is Lucille, this my baby.

(kissing noises) (audience laughter)

- That's not the guitar I saw you with last night, B.B.

(audience laughter)

- The first one that was named Lucille was

because of a fight in a little night club.

And we'd play there in the winter.

Had something like that big garbage can,

just like that one, just like it,

but a little larger than that.

And they would half-fill the can

with kerosene, light that fuel

and that's what we had for heat.

So this particular night, two guys start to fighting,

and one of them knocked the other one

over on this container.

And the fuel, you know, spilled on the floor,

and it was already burning, so as they tried to put it out,

it seemed to burn more.

Everybody in the little club was dancing

started to run outside, including me.

But when I got on the outside, I remembered that I had

ran off and left my guitar.

So I started back for it, and the fellas

that were working with me said, "No, don't do it,"

but I went anyway, and I got my guitar,

but I was almost burned to death trying to save it.

So the next morning, we found that

two men had gotten burned,

got trapped in the building, got burned to death.

And we also found that these two guys

was fighting about a lady.

The lady's name was Lucille.

I named my guitar Lucille to remind me

not to do a thing like that again, and I haven't.

(laughing)

* Now, darling

* Know I love you *

- [Morgan] Beale Street entrepreneur Robert Henry

started to look after the interests of B.B. King.

This resulted in a national tour

of the main Black theaters and clubs,

known as "the Chitlin' Circuit."

The road was no place for a marriage.

The road was B.B. King's new home.

And he told me, he say, "'Cille," I say, "Yes?"

He say, "Martha done left me."

I say, "Girl, why you leave him?"

And she say, "'Cause he won't stay at home.

"He playing and going everywhere."

I said, "Martha, B.B. can't like

"all them womens liking him."

I say, "He playing."

I say, "Girl, you crazy.

"You should stay with your husband."

But she didn't.

- This business is a very difficult business.

But I couldn't live without it,

and I don't think he can live without it either.

* Oh, now left me,

* baby, for someone else *

(lively big-band-style music)

- B.B. was appearing with the Bill Harvey Band,

and Bill Harvey's band backed B.B.

- Harvey wrote and arranged

for everybody who was anybody.

- Sunbeam introduced B.B. to Bill Harvey, right?

- Well, in a sense, Robert Henry,

because Robert Henry was his day-to-day man on Beale Street.

- When Bill Harvey signed on to B.B.,

Bill Harvey, I think, Bill Harvey had about 11.

Yeah, he had an 11-piece.

And he stayed with B.B. for 14 years.

- Every record that B.B. put out after Harvey got with him,

the first one was "Woke Up this Morning,"

was a hit, hit, hit.

- A little bit later on after I had been touring for a while,

then I turned the disc jockey loose and just toured.

And I'm still doing that.

- At the time when B.B. got his first bus,

there was excitement because coming out of a station wagon

into a big Continental Trailways bus

was just a marvelous feat for the group.

And it was something that

none of the other groups had either,

'cause he was among the first people with a big bus.

- I'd seen Duke Ellington, Count Basie, Cab Calloway,

Gene Krupa, many others

that had big band,

I was learning from listening to them, from time to time,

getting a chance to hear 'em sometime.

And that made me very proud.

So some of them had buses, and I wanted a bus.

And I bought it.

(bus engine starting)

- This is the original picture of the B.B. King Band

on Beale Street in 1955.

Beale and Hernando, between Hernando and 3rd Street.

- I think everybody knows this band

as the B.B. King Band.

This the B.B. King Band.

No matter how many bands he goes through,

this will always be the B.B. King Band.

- We were bad. (laughter)

Yeah, we were good.

Under your seat, you would have

a box of food,

like pork and beans, and sardines and crackers,

and that kind of stuff, because a lot of times,

you wouldn't have time to eat at

a restaurant or cafe, per se,

and it was very difficult, 'cause a lot of the places

you couldn't go in anyway.

- And I've seen the Promised Land.

I may not get there with you, but I want you to know tonight

that we as a people will get to the Promised Land.

- Desegregation of America didn't start until the '60s.

And B.B. had been on the road

for a good 10, 12 years before that.

You couldn't live.

It was just a Chitlin' Circuit.

That's what they called it.

Negro baseball played it.

The big Black bands played

the Chitlin' circles all over America.

That's what they called the Black community,

the Chitlin' Circuit.

- But y'all didn't think y'all was

the Chitlin' Circuit, did you?

- Well, there wasn't nothing bad about it,

that was just the title.

- But I mean, y'all didn't realize

that it was quote unquote, "The Chitlin' Circuit."

- Everybody knew that the Black section of America

was the Chitlin' Circuit.

- [Cato] But Ernest, hold on-- - We didn't refer to it as--

- You have to understand-- - [Cato] I'm sayin' they didn't

refer to it as the Chitlin' Circuit.

- [Ernest] Yes, they did!

If you get any books out of that period,

you'll know that that period was the Chitlin' Circuit.

- The musicians accepted the word "Chitlin' Circuit."

- That's where Negroes played.

- They accepted that because you were playing Black clubs.

You were playing Black ballrooms.

- It wasn't no sign up.

It was just verbiage.

- "Chitlin' Circuit"? - [Voiceover] Yeah.

- (laughing) I don't know what that is.

- You couldn't go to the best of hotels,

so you stayed in motels, Black motels,

and flop houses, or in people's homes.

The '60s in the marches, I was in Birmingham, Alabama,

and we stayed at a motel called Gaston's Motel.

And they was trying to kill Dr. King.

So, Dr. King was like, I'm in, maybe 7,

and he's in room, maybe like, 10.

So they blew up the room between us,

thinking we was in there.

They blew up the rooms of the motel.

I think that's as close a time as I come

to getting killed, like that.

- You know, you would go through hell with

gasoline drawers on to be able to play the music, you know?

So whatever, whatever it took.

And they gave him a place to play,

whether it was segregated or what, you know?

- We just played everywhere, Apollo Theater

to the honky-tonk joints, all over the country.

- He was working.

That was his whole essence.

His essence was to work to pay his band.

- B. was always on the road.

He's the only I guy, I think, I think he had a record

that he played 365 days one year.

And I tell him all the time, "I don't want that record.

"You can keep that one."

You know?

- I used to work like, 320 days a year.

B.B. worked more gigs.

- I don't know where he gets the energy from.

I mean, this man works more than anybody,

because the road is his home.

(blues music)

- No night off, 365 days a year.

Some days, we didn't even get a chance to go to sleep.

* I've got a sweet little angel

* I love the way she spreads her wings *

- He told me he wasn't gonna ask my mom to get married

because he felt that she would say no,

and he didn't want that.

So he said, "We'll just have to wait until you get 18."

So I said, "Okay."

And that's what we did.

And he was in Detroit at the time.

Actually, I was 18 in March, but he wanted to put off

getting married until June, when we were in Detroit,

because he wanted Reverend Franklin,

who's Aretha Franklin's father, to marry us.

So we waited until we got to Detroit, got the license,

and Reverend Franklin married us.

- All I know is he'd be a hard man

to have a relationship with,

because he's moving so fast.

I mean, the dude sits down when he's playing.

But he is running through the year.

- After we got married, we got in a car

and went to Cleveland, and went to work,

and just kept going after that.

Just one day led into another.

* Yes, all right now *

In the early days, we'd love to go fishing.

Any time he had the opportunity, he would go fishing.

So one day he told me he was going fishing

and he went out to the car, and I said,

"You're going fishing in your suit?"

He says, "That's all I have."

He says, "I don't have any other clothes,

so I have to go fishing in a suit."

And it was a silk suit.

So, he went fishing in a silk suit.

And it just shows you whatever he wanted to do

and however he felt like doing it,

he would do it, no matter what.

(lively blues music)

- ABC Paramount offered him, I don't know, it was $25,000,

and Jules wouldn't renew the contract for $25,000.

- I have a friend name Fats Domino.

Fats Domino was with ABC.

At that time, it looked like everything he touched

was a hit record, so that's when he told me

that I was with the wrong people.

- B.B. would have stayed with us if Jules

would have given him the $25,000, upfront.

(guitar solo music)

- First, I wanna say, when I try to play,

I try to play not just for myself.

I try to play for people.

I want them to laugh.

I want them to smile.

- If you want to see what love is,

just go to a B.B. King concert.

And it doesn't make any difference where it's at

or how big the joint is, 'cause whatever size it is,

it's gonna be packed.

- The blues becomes a living thing when he's playing it.

It's not just somebody trying to play the blues.

It becomes a palpable presence on stage.

(B.B. guitar solo)

- B.B. King is gone when he's playing.

B.B. King's been gone in the world of the blues,

just living in that, that ether for so long

that he belongs to it.

- I looked over, I heard this sound of, like,

a 747 taking off, which is his voice.

And I noticed as he stepped back from the microphone,

his voice got louder, and I,

then I realized, as they say in New Orleans,

this is some other kind of shit.

This is some other kind of shit (laughs)

I don't know.

There's some shamanism involved.

- I think when I was 15, I went and saw B.B. in concert,

and it completely changed my life.

- It's not about technique at all.

- The first thing that inspired me that, you know,

that I got from B.B. King--

- He's concerned with telling a story.

- Was the direct...

Speaking to one, you know.

- He's concerned with moving people.

And I have, all of my career,

with my writing and my playing,

I have tried to maintain my focus on that.

- B.B. King's tone was the first sound that,

I now call it S-O-C-C.

It means "the Sound of Collective Consciousness."

(B.B. soloing on guitar)

- That's what music is, you're taking your life

and the hardest moments or the highest moments,

and you're putting it to words and melody,

and you're making people feel it.

That's what you're supposed to be doing.

It's not paint by numbers.

- You can write a song and bullshit with it,

but you can't, If you don't sell it,

what the hell did you cut it for?

B.B. knew how to sell it.

He was great at this.

- [Voiceover] How about a nice, warm round of applause

to welcome the world's greatest blues singer,

the king of the blues, B.B. King!

(applause) (cheering)

- When B.B. would come to Chicago,

he'd play a lot of different venues.

He'd play clubs, dances and places like that.

And he also played the Regal Theater.

- Jimi Hendrix gave me my first copy of "Live at the Regal."

- For me, that's just like the ultimate live

B.B. King blues album.

- "Live at the Regal" was the first record that I played

every day, probably 20 to 25 times a day.

I would listen to that every day.

- Recordings like "Live at the Regal"

and "Live at Cook County Jail" are two of my favorite

live albums of all time.

I think the fire and the passion in which he was performing

on those two recordings is, I think it's hard

to come close to matching that.

(B.B. playing guitar)

- And "Live at the Regal" was this pivotal

musical watershed, that took me away from the...

The British blues temporarily,

where I had just discovered the American blues

for the very first time after listening to Clapton

and Peter Green, and, you know,

Paul Kossoff and the band Free,

and The Jeff Beck Group, you know, every incarnation

of John Mayall and the Bluesbreakers.

- One of the things that B.B. has is a great rapport

with the audience, you know, I mean,

he did that song...

(singing) I bought you a brand new Ford

And you wanted a Cadillac

* I bought you a $10 dinner

* You said thanks for the snack

- (singing) I let you stay in my penthouse

And you said it was just a shack

I gave you seven children

And now you wanna give 'em back

* And now you wanna give 'em back

* Yeah, I've been downhearted, baby

- You wanna hear B.B. King at the crème de la crème,

like Dexter Gordon would say, listen to Live at Regal,

and every note, every word, every song,

everything is a perfect, flawless diamond, you know?

And that's where Peter Green got his tone.

When you hear Peter Green, he sounds like B.B. King,

Live at Regal.

- I remember, he had the big, thick notes, so,

(mimics guitar notes)

(mumbles) big, thick notes.

Not tangy or twangy, he starts off from there

and goes through the tones of the guitar.

- All of us in this genre, or all of us in

any kind of, um, roots music,

we take what came before us.

- The people I think that influenced me the most

was Lowell Fulson, Elmore James.

I was crazy about Charlie Christian.

And I also liked...

One of my favorites, real favorites, was Django Reinhardt.

(old-timey blues music)

I was crazy about Blind Lemon and Lonnie Johnson.

Just the sound that they had made me, I don't know,

tingle inside or somethin'

- The last two or three generations are all students of B.B.

Everybody from B.B.'s generation are all students of T-Bone.

I mean, he really was "the guy."

- Well just before I went in the Army, about '42, I think,

I heard of a guy called T-Bone Walker.

* I'm in love with a woman

* But she's not in love with me *

- T-Bone really was a dancer.

And you know, he had such a beautiful style.

And even when he played, you know, he danced.

There's something about that and something

about the simplicity of the melodies, you know?

He would play over a minor blues or whatnot,

I think, I definitely hear, there's what I call

"the B.B. house," when you're sit, you know,

playing in a certain key, and then you move up,

basically, like, four frets or so,

and there's this little area that I call

"the B.B. King house."

And I think some of that I remember hearing

in T-Bone's playing as well but then,

B.B. really made it his own.

- T-Bone Walker I thought was the best ever at doing

what he did and how he did it.

I loved him, still do.

And I imagine today if you listen to my playing,

you'll hear a little bit of all of them.

I'm telling my secret.

But I think a little bit of all of those people I liked

with my own ideas, I created

the B.B. King twangy guitar sound, maybe.

(laid-back blues instrumental)

- It's tough because usually divorces come because

of cheating, or you fall out of love,

or you have money problems.

And we've had all those things, and we've survived 'em.

But the love always stayed.

And you know, it's...

You just have to do it.

- If you're gonna be a traveling musician,

marriage should be a something you wouldn't want to do

until you're not traveling a lot,

because it's very few traveling musicians that I know

that have been able and successful in marriage life.

- It's very difficult to have a family life with someone

who's working on the road 365 days a year.

And, the...

We did have somewhat of an agreement that

that he would cut back some

on his work, but that was very unrealistic

for me to expect.

And you get to a point that you realize

that it's unrealistic.

'Cause the nice thing is when you are married,

terrible thing when you're being divorced.

It's awful.

- If I had to do it all over again,

would I, at this stage?

Yes, I would.

* Oh, I guess it's the chains that bind me

* I can't shake loose these chains and things

- [Voiceover] He came to me, I didn't come to him.

- [Voiceover] Right.

- [Voiceover] Now he was brought to me because he had

financial problems, big time.

And he couldn't do anything, you know?

And he had to understand, and he had to listen

to the rules, and he did.

- Sid helped me out, helped me to

get out of trouble with the government,

a few other things, so I said, well, look, you're my CPA,

but you've been doing everything that my manager should do.

Well, why don't you be my manager?

In fact, I asked him, he didn't ask me.

- [Voiceover] I set up a master plan where we would

be able to expose B.B. out of the Chitlin' Circuit,

and get over into the crossover area

so he could make some money.

He wasn't making any money to speak of, you know?

Sid absolutely was sort of a gateway to B.B.'s career.

And everything after that time period, it was kind of,

sort of, you know, it was already in place.

(old-timey blues instrumental)

(upbeat, modern blues instrumental)

- I didn't really become aware of

blues, in general, until...

The English guitar players started talking about it.

- They're serious blues hounds, the English.

The Rolling Stones and The Beatles, all those guys.

- You know, growing up,

I loved the blues, in my teenage years.

I mean, Lightnin' Hopkins is my hero,

so besides everyone else,

of course, I heard of B.B. King then.

- [Voiceover] I mean, I'm really very embarrassed about

my guitar playing in one way

because it's very poor, you know?

I can never move.

But I can make a guitar speak.

See, one part of me says, "Yes, of course I can play

because I can make a rock move.

But the other part of me says, "Well, I wish I could

"just do it like B.B. King."

If you put me with B.B., I would feel silly.

- Whatever he was saying,

he was an incredible guitarist, John.

Even his attempts at soloing

were just so wild and aggressive.

I loved his playing

But, you know, B.B. is a guitarist.

You know what I mean, you can,

you have to admire how that man is and how he plays.

- By the time I'd done most of my homework,

which was during my mid-20s, I was very fortunate to get

invited to play by John Mayall.

- I would say that Eric was most influenced

by Freddie King's playing.

Mick Taylor was most influenced by Albert King.

And Peter Green was most definitely a B.B. King devotee.

- When I first met Jimi Hendrix, he talked about B.B. King.

Said, "Now he comes out and plays just

"a couple of notes, you know, sort of."

Yeah, I know what you're saying.

What you could say with a lot of notes,

you could say with, B.B. King would say

with a couple of notes, you know?

(impersonating guitar)

- The wonderful thing about the three Kings...

Is we all learned to play from them.

- The English Invasion, I think that really introduced

a lot of of Americans, including me, to Howlin' Wolf,

and Slim Harpo, and Muddy Waters.

I probably got more exposed to that kind of Chicago blues,

and B.B. King through that axis of the

English blues guys and Eric Clapton, those.

It was a great gift the Brits gave us.

- When Cream did Strange Brew, I hated the song so much.

The only thing I could do to give it some stability

or justify doing it,

was to quote Albert King in the guitar solo.

That was the first thing that Jimi remarked on when we met.

You know, he said, "Oh, you know about that?"

And I would do the same thing.

I would dangle carrots in front of the other musicians.

We did that to one another.

- So the British blues for me was more immediate

and it was more exciting, it was louder,

it tended to be a Les Paul guitar and a Marshall amp.

It was more rock.

(rock-style blues music)

- We do it better.

That was the thing.

We do it better.

But it seemed to have had that elevation,

that difference when the white boys

start to singing the blues.

And they really put it on a different kind of a scale.

- All the great blues musicians, initially,

did only play to Black audiences.

And that's why that when they came over to Europe

to find that they were revered like gods,

it was like a big surprise to most of them.

- We didn't know how to play for any white audience.

Every once in a while, I'd have Eric Clapton,

and I'm laughing right now.

It was Eric Clapton, Paul Butterfield,

Michael Bloomfield, when they started showing up

in clubs in Chicago, we wasn't making enough money

to buy a bottle of whiskey, so we'd go to next door

to get the bottle of wine out the liquor store,

which was cheaper.

And every time I saw a white face, I said,

look out, man, there's a cop in the house, you know?

And that was these kids coming in picking up

on the type of blues that Muddy and we all was playing.

- When I was 17 at a club in Beaumont called The Raven,

I had a fake ID and got in.

- We were playin',

and I saw these four white people come in,

and one was extra white, Johnny Winter.

- I kept sending the band members up to ask him

if it was okay if I played,

and he didn't even know if I could play at all.

- Can he play?

He said, "Yes."

And he said, "Will you let him play?"

I said, I don't know, I'll let you know in a little while.

- We were the only white people in the club.

And he'd been having tax problems,

and he thought we were from the IRS coming

to bust him for his taxes.

- So I was so shocked and surprised

that it wasn't about the IRS,

'til it took me a little while to kind of get

my feet back on the ground, you know.

He kept saying, "Well, we have arrangements."

And I said, "I've heard all your records.

"I know all of your arrangements"

He asked to see my union card.

Yeah, he really checked me out.

- I let him sit in, and he was good.

I'll tell you, he was good.

'Cause I tried him.

I went through three or four

different keys that a lot of guys

are not too familiar with.

And I was enjoying it.

(laughing)

But he was a genuine guy.

- He's a saint.

He's a blues saint.

- [Voiceover] Many of these young players coming along today

have been really turned on by the way you play the guitar,

people like Mike Bloomfield.

- Oh, he's wonderful.

- [Voiceover] Do you hear yourself coming back

from those bands?

Well...

Yes, I believe I do.

I don't want to stick my neck out there, but I think so.

But I'm grateful that some of them seem to like me.

I'm grateful because,

to me, it seemed to open a few doors for us

that seemed like they was never gonna be opened.

* Oh, because I

* I need your love so bad

* Need a soft voice

* to talk to me at night *

- The first chance to play in front of a white audience

it's just like, who are these people and, you know.

- I sent my road manager in there, and he told them to go

and tell Bill I was there,

but I thought it was the wrong place, so we was gonna leave.

So, Bill came back out with the road manager,

and came on the bus and sat down.

He said, "No, you're at the right place."

- I happened to be there.

The opening act was Otis Rush

and Steve Miller, and B.B. King.

- And he said, "Ladies and gentlemen."

And would you believe that when he said that,

you could hear a pin drop?

He said, "I bring you the Chairman of the Board, B.B. King."

I've never been introduced like that before or since.

When he mentioned my name, they all stood up.

And for about three or four tunes after that,

they would stand up after every tune.

And I was so touched till I cried standing up there.

- You know, it's like watching a chandelier.

All I could see was his tears and the diamond ring

that he had to wipe his tears.

And I was still washing dishes at the time.

I was living with my mom.

And when I saw B.B. receive that kind of adulation,

that kind of honor...

I said, "This is what I want."

- So I felt weird.

I felt real weird.

But I did it.

And after that I cried back up the stairway.

- It's like when Nat King Cole broke through

and they accepted him, so we kept doing that

after the initial '68 period,

working the Fillmore, working colleges,

and then all of sudden we were able to book B.B.

into these rock and roll clubs,

and other venues that never had Black entertainers before.

- He shifted a gear from playing in Black clubs.

All of a sudden, he was playing for white audiences.

And it shifted a couple of gears right there.

And then B.B. could do whatever the hell he wanted to do.

- In their early days, including mine, you didn't get paid.

You played well and you got drunk, if you drank.

And if you played well enough, you got a good-looking woman.

So this was your pay.

- Women just scream, "B.B, B.B., B.B., B.B!"

- [B.B] Wait a minute now, Solomon.

- How you sell BBs? - [B.B.] Solomon, you are--

- How you sell BBs to women?

Tell them, "This is B.B. King's BBs."

- Oh, yeah, I've been called a womanizer.

I've been called many things pertaining to women.

Most of them are true, and I love women.

- But you know there was one woman that loved you,

and she had the bank.

I remember her name, Carrie Cunningham.

- Oh, yes, yes, yes.

- And she said, "I'd die for a B.B. King.

"If he'd just come up in this hotel one night,

"I'll rape him, eat him, and cook him."

(laughter)

- I ain't never met a woman yet that I didn't like.

But not to sleep with them all, but I like 'em.

I think they're the angels of the Earth.

I don't think that most women

would want me now, at my age.

Oh, a few might cause they might think I've saved

a dollar or two, here and there.

Well, maybe a couple.

* The thrill is gone

* The thrill is gone away

* Oh, the thrill is gone, baby

* The thrill is gone away

- I had been there about eight months, and in the interim,

I'd obviously looked at the artist roster

that was there, and I was, been a B.B. fan

since I was a kid, literally.

And I kept buggin' 'em, I wanna produce B.B. King.

I wanna produce B.B, "Well, you can't do that."

Well, why not?

"Well, you're white, and you're too young."

* You know you done me wrong, baby

* And you're gonna be sorry someday

- I figured if I could take some different players

and put 'em around B.B.,

that something good would happen.

So I pitched him on the idea,

and he said, he was interested,

but he said, "I don't want to really commit to this

"for a full album."

So I said well, how about we do half of it

live with your band,

and then half of it with my band in the studio?

And he said, "Okay, we'll do it that way."

So thusly, Live & Well.

Very shortly after, I think it was only like

eight months later,

we were scheduled to do another album, and I said,

I'd like to do it all with my band, he said,

"Sure, let's do it all that way."

And that was, and the big success that resulted

out of the second album was The Thrill is Gone.

* The thrill is gone

* The thrill is gone away *

- We recorded that maybe at around 10, 11 o'clock at night,

and I'm listening back to it at around two in the morning

you know, going through everything that

we'd recorded that day.

And I had the idea to put strings on it.

And I think that's probably the best idea

I've ever had in my career (laughs).

Because I think that's what took it to the pop charts.

- John actually brought in The Thrill is Gone

and played it to all of us.

I have that great memory of that.

- And I think that song might have been one of the

biggest blues songs of all time, The Thrill is Gone.

- I thought it was a great use of,

you know, strings and the blues.

And it was like, you know, it was blues-y, but pop.

It was really a cool song.

- Nobody in the blues had strings, no one.

They never thought of a blues player

having strings behind him.

That was just not common.

So when it did happen,

it changed the recording industry.

It changed it.

- Well, I'm forever in his debt for

allowing me to produce him,

and then bring a new idea to him, you know,

which really did establish my career as a producer.

- B.B. had a really, a million-selling record then.

And that really put B.B. King into

a different category completely.

* I am the little red rooster

* Too lazy to crow *

- Sid was a big proponent of exposing B.B.

to other audiences.

So, sometimes, he took dates that were

not as lucrative financially, in order to bring him to

other audiences that were not exposed to him.

Uh, somehow or another, my manger had talked with, uh,

some of the people connected with the Stones and asked them,

or presented my name to them,

that if they needed a kind of a,

you might say, a warm-up group or something of that sort,

that I was available.

- We never saw B.B., or had anything to do with B.B. until

uh, '69, when we took him on tour.

* Hounds begin to howl *

- We had Ike and Tina Turner, and uh,

B.B. King, and uh, Terry Reid.

- We used to go in the wings when he was playing.

It was just a revelation, just seeing

what he could do with dynamics.

He took it to a completely different level with his

going from a whisper.

He'd take the band right down to a whisper.

And it was amazing.

You'd just hear the... (mimicking guitar playing)

with the little guitar like this, and then he'd build,

and build, and build into this massive,

sort of sound with the band.

(soft blues music)

I'd never heard dynamics like that.

I've never heard them since.

I don't think anybody else has ever managed to achieve that

kind of thing that he did.

- In a way, I think it was an interesting time

for Black blues musician, because it was probably one

of the few times they got to play in stadiums

to a white, predominately white audience.

- Yeah, it would of, um, exposed him because we,

that was a fantastic tour.

That was like the best tour we'd ever done.

- The many people that I hadn't played, you know, to,

or hadn't heard of me, started to, I think,

listen to me, or pay attention to me from that tour.

* Please, drive him home *

- The kids always asked us where we got the songs from.

America.

They said, "Where can we hear this kind of music?"

And we said, "Just go across the river and there it is."

They would ask us, people from Chicago,

but they weren't allowed to go across the river at that time

because of racial problems, and it was very dangerous.

We'd jump in a taxi and say,

"Take us to the South Side to a record."

And the guy would say, "You shouldn't go there,

"you shouldn't go there you don't want to go there."

We said, "Just take us to a record store," you know.

And so, he'd take us to a record store,

and we'd rush in and look at the singles and all that,

and grab a handful, say, "How much?"

"Twenty dollars," pay it,

jump back in the taxi and tear back to the safe side.

- They themselves will be the first ones to admit

that they started out as a blues band.

They were always very good at playing homage to the, um,

the blues artists that influenced them.

- We went to record at the legendary Chess Studios,

which is on South Michigan Avenue.

When we're in the studio, we met everyone that

was recording there.

You know, we met all our favorites,

like Muddy Waters, Chuck Berry, Willie Dixon.

And I just want to, just was thinking about it.

I was remembering how generous they were to us, you know,

because we must have, we must have,

they must have thought we were like from Mars or something,

you know, like. (audience laughs)

- They wanted to know, like, how we would do it,

and why we wanted to do it.

You know what I mean?

"Why you wanna play like me."

And we're, "It happens to be very good stuff."

You know (laughs).

And one day, I might get there.

- They were very, very generous to us.

And they passed on all the tips, and gave us all the help.

And they were very, very kind.

And I want to salute those guys.

Most of them are not with us anymore.

Of course, one is B.B. King, who I...

(audience applause)

(laid-back blues music)

- The only tune I ever brought in

that I just asked B.B. to do,

and that was Hummingbird, the Leon Russell song.

And, um, to get Leon to come and play with B.B., you know.

Getting people to come play with B.B. was never a problem.

- I played on, on a song called Hummingbird,

that, uh, Leon Russell wrote.

- He plays those little obligatos when he sings,

he plays a lick, and sings,

and plays another lick.

Turns out, he does that when he talks, too.

So, he was talking to me and,

"You know, and one time, I was down in Tuscaloosa and..."

(mimicking guitar)

And I listened to it a couple of times,

then I started playing the background to it.

And they're not all the same.

They're not in the same keys.

They're not the same groove or anything.

And so, he'd...

Finish it, would finished the song, whatever, in what key,

whatever it was, played the ending.

He didn't say anything.

And he started talking about something else,

then he played something else, and I'd play that background.

We got into about the third one, and B.B. started crying.

He says, uh, he said, "I've never had that before."

So, uh, it was very touching to me.

Uh, I was such a student of his,

I knew what he meant when

he said those things on the guitar.

So it was the greatest compliment.

(gospel-style singing)

(upbeat, energetic blues music)

- [Morgan] In 1971, B.B. King flew the nest

and ventured on his first overseas tour.

This culminated in a collaborative album called

B.B. King in London.

* And I love her just the same *

- Okay, we're starting again from the top.

So you get a feel of what I'm talking about.

Not the top of the, the top of the last one.

Okay?

* Fast moving baby

* I can't do nothing to slow you down

* Your speed is supersonic, mama

* And you're faster than sound

* Now, now *

- [Voiceover] I don't know.

- You don't belong to the union, man!

(laughter)

- When B.B. came to London to make that album,

B.B. in London,

uh, I was invited to play.

It was just incredible.

We're playing away, and B.B. sort of looks at me.

And I thought, "Oh, he wants to end the song."

So, I...

(mimicking percussion)

And he goes, "Too good to lose."

And we came right in again.

It was like, oh my God, It was so great!

We just kicked it in again.

And, uh, he did pay me a huge compliment in those sessions,

'cause he called me,

"Hey, Ringo, you were just like

"a clock, tick-tock, tick-tock."

- He just had everything,

everything that you'd want out of performer, you know?

He had the energy, the charisma, you know.

He's handsome, he's got beautiful tone.

Everything had a meaning.

Every note just like a punch.

(cheering)

- In 1974, I produced a big event.

I stepped out of my usual life and produced this big event,

in Zaire in 1974, that surrounded the fight between

George Foreman and Muhammad Ali.

And I brought B.B. over.

B.B came without a band, and, uh, was backed

by The Crusaders, who I was producing then.

So B.B. was knocked out with how that went.

A few years later, I got a call from B.B. saying that

he really needed to make a record, and uh,

would I be interested?

So we sat down with, um, Joe Sample from The Crusaders,

who was the piano player, and I put him together

with a great lyricist, a young lyricist

named Will Jennings, at the time.

We made our first record with B.B.

The magic of recording is the danger in recording.

When someone's played something for three years, and they

come up, they walk into a studio and play it, they know it.

They've been through it so many times.

But when they're engaging it for the first time,

and if you can capture that moment,

you got yourself something special.

* You know I'm having so much trouble, people

* Oh, I wonder

* Yes, I wonder

* Baby, I wonder

* Oh, what in the world is gonna happen to me *

(cheering) (applause)

* Turn out the light, sleep won't come *

- Could have been with someone like Bill Szymczyk, a genius.

Take you in the studio, "What you gon' do?

"One, two, three, four, five, which one you gonna do?"

Five.

He'd let you do it.

And that's the way I think a good producer should be.

* Hold on

* I feel our love is changing

* Hold on *

- The end of that first album, he said, "I made a mistake,

"I left Sid, I wish I hadn't done it, It was a mistake.

"And uh, I don't know if Sid would ever--"

I said, "What are you trying to say, B.?"

He says, "Well, I think we got a winner here,

"and I need somebody to help me navigate it.

"You know what I mean?"

So I said, well, why don't I make a call to Sid.

You want me to do that?

And I said, Sid, I think we got a hit album with B.B.

He wants you to come back.

He said, "Did he say that?"

I said, not in that many words, but I think you

should come out, man.

He says, "I'll take the red eye."

So the next day, he showed up at the studio,

and they were there till the day Sid died.

* I'm nothing without you here *

- There was a time when he was doing 300-plus days a year.

And I'm talking about back in the late '70s,

and all through the '80s,

and the first part of the '90s.

- [Morgan] Many people tend to slow down in their 60s.

Not B.B. King.

His next collaboration with a young band from Ireland

was about to propel B.B. to a whole new audience.

- [Voiceover] Well, you tour with Rolling Stones.

And then you go with the popular group of the now,

and that's with Bono and U2.

Huh?

- [B.B.] (laughing) My number one.

(upbeat rock music)

- Keith Richards played blues records to us, um,

and it began this kind of journey to discover, um,

who were the greats.

And, you know, B.B. King's not just,

you know, great.

He's like, great!

(applause) (cheering)

Believe it or not, B.B. King came to Dublin, Ireland.

And he was playing in this club in Dublin, Ireland,

and we wrote this song for him.

This is called "When Love Comes to Town."

- I had went to listen to the tape, and I was able to, uh,

kind of get some of it together.

- I hope you like the song.

- I love the song.

I think the lyrics is really, real heavy lyrics.

You're mighty young to write such heavy lyrics.

(laughing)

* Ay, yeah, yeah, yeah

* Ay, yeah, yeah, yeah

* I was a sailor, I was lost at sea *

- You know, I felt, we were pretty popular at the time,

Number-one records,

um, on the cover of Time magazine.

Uh, I gave it my absolute...

You know, everything I had in that howl,

um, at the start of the song.

And then B.B. King opened up his mouth,

and I felt like a girl.

* I stand accused of the things I've said

* Love comes to town, I'm gonna jump that train

* When love comes to town, I'm gonna catch that flame

* Maybe I was wrong to ever let you down

* But I did what I did before love came to town *

We had learned.

We'd absorbed.

But the more we tried to be like B.B.,

the less convincing we were.

- I'm no good with chords, so, uh,

what we do is get somebody else to play chords.

Sure, well, Edge will do that.

There's not much chords in this song.

I think there's only two.

I'm horrible with chords.

(B.B. soloing on guitar)

- When we were working on "When Love Comes to Town,"

we were sitting around,

and we were showing him the chords.

And he said, "Gentlemen.

"Gentlemen.

"I don't do chords.

"I do this."

- I don't know what to do there.

I'll just turn the...

(bluesy guitar notes)

- There's a lesson in that.

He is as Keith Richards, um, describes...

Um, a specialist.

* I was a sailor, I was lost at sea

* I was under the waves, before love rescued me

* I was a fighter, I could turn on a thread

* Now I stand accused of the things I've said *

But there was this great sense of camaraderie in his band.

And it was a joy, just a joy,

to share a stage with B.B. King.

A rich, brassy sound they had behind them

with the horn section, and then,

his grace, you know?

He's, he's a lesson in grace.

* But I did what I did before love came to town *

- We did Japan, Australia, and New Zealand, and uh, Europe.

But we did a four-month tour.

And, uh, that was some of the biggest audiences

I've ever seen, uh,

70,000, 80,000 people, as far as the eye could see.

It was something different.

- I think our audience really took to him.

And, uh, and I would like to think that

whatever town he turns up in,

there's some U2 fans there, even now.

(energetic music)

All right.

Might as well go for it.

- [B.B.] A lot of emotion right there.

That's all right, young man.

That's all right.

- The debt is very much, um, in his direction.

(slow guitar solo music)

The character of any great musician is usually

identifiable by the individuality of the vibrato.

Most players are recognizable by that particular facet

of their playing.

And that's how I would know B.B.'s playing.

And I can tell B.B. from one note, you know?

Most of us can, I think.

- I'd say that's true.

Yeah, yeah.

I mean, his sound is completely unique to him.

- If you can just play one note and somebody else can, say,

"Recognize who that is."

- From one note, you know that's him and Lucille.

- He can take one note and make it so sexy.

- One note, you know, is all it takes.

- The note with the vibrato.

- One note.

- One note.

- One note.

(guitar solo music)

- He tried to show me how to do it.

He sat with me with his guitar, Lucille,

and showed me how to do it.

And I'm buggered if I could do it.

I tried everything.

I tried all of that, and all of this.

Nothing.

I said, it don't happen for me!

That's probably why I am a bass player.

- That note is not in the amplifier, and it's not,

it's not even on his fingers.

It's coming from the center of his heart.

You know, I can hear B.B. King with the sound off on the TV

just by looking at his face.

- I remember Eric Clapton was on CNN,

and they asked him who he had never played with.

And B.B, evidently, was watching it, because I was.

And he said, "B.B. King."

- The first time I met him, I sat and played with him.

I mean, I've seen, there are pictures of me and him playing,

sitting on amplifiers.

It was a long time ago.

It's '66, '67.

And that was it for me, for having my dreams come true.

* I dreamed I had a good job, and I got well paid

* I blew it all at the penny arcade *

- The CD he did with me called Riding with The King,

he named it, I didn't!

He had the ideas, most of the ideas for it.

He had them, I didn't.

And it was my CD.

But I had told him when we started,

because his ideas I respect.

- "Next year, don't do anything during that period,

"and we'll do it."

And he stuck to it, you know.

He kept, It was a commitment we both kept.

- When I'm going in the studio to do what I do,

I don't need you, Eric, nobody else,

to show me what I wanna do.

But I'll listen to ideas.

And I listened to a lot of his ideas,

and he had a lot of good ones for Riding with The King.

- So I thought, well the best thing to do is, I'll just,

we'll just go into the room with a couple of

acoustic guitars and see what comes out.

- Whatever you think is good, we'll try it.

And we did.

And they were good.

Everything.

Except trying to make me play acoustic guitar.

I didn't like that.

(laughing)

I had been cut all to pieces

by a guy called Alexis Korner.

Alexis Korner said, "B., I got two modern guitars,

"acoustic guitars.

"And I got an idea for something I call 'Alexis Boogie,'

"so let's try it."

But, boy, when we started to recording,

he just cut me to pieces.

I said, "Ha!

"I will never play another one as long as you're alive."

(laughing)

And I didn't.

I promised I wouldn't do it again,

but Alexis is dead now, so I'll try it.

And he did the same thing,

cut me to pieces.

So, I won't do it again.

- (laughing) You're kidding!

He has ears, um, that you wouldn't believe.

So, you know, we all do, to a certain extent,

but he is, you know, beyond anything,

so if you, if you mimic him,

if he throws out a phrase and you,

you manage to articulate it back at him,

he will take that and then modify.

I mean, he's always, you know.

From day one with B.B. from that day

at the Cafe au Go Go until now,

you know, we just sit down and play, and have a few laughs

along the way, it's very relaxed.

- B.B. was doing something no one has ever done.

And all your rock guitar players and whatever

you wanna call it right now, if you take the big amplifiers

away from 'em,

and the all the special effects, you hear B.B. King.

- I mean, I don't think I pick up the guitar without playing

at least one or two B.B. King licks, like within

the first five minutes that I'm playing the guitar.

- He has got a certain melodic sense

that is unique to himself.

And it really has a personal thing for my own

personal tastes that I really identify with.

- He's paving the way.

And it gives me great hopes for the future.

Every time I start thinking, well, geez,

I'm officially not young anymore, there's B.B.

Well, I don't need to worry.

Look at him.

- He's a grand, majestic spirit,

that when he plays, it commands respect.

- 'Cause these youngsters are playing so good.

I hear them and say to myself, oh, God.

I might as well quit.

And then the other mind says, "How you gon' eat?"

(laughing)

So, that's one of the reasons that I haven't quit.

- I think that he's gonna keep on doing

what he's been doing.

At the moment, um, we work

three weeks on and three weeks off.

And B.B. used the expression,

"That's gonna be carved in stone."

(cheering)

- When you mention the name B.B. King,

everybody can identify with his hometown,

and many of them began to know that,

that hometown is Indianola, Mississippi.

(laid-back blues music)

- The Medgar Evers Homecoming is

originally started by B.B. King.

Every year I go down there for what we call Homecoming.

B.B. came up, and the state of Mississippi was ,

sweltering hate, and racism and bigotry.

And anyone who had the nerve and fortitude to go out

and fight to change that, B.B. supported.

And Medgar was the one who chose to do that in Mississippi,

and the first to lead us into that.

- [Morgan] In 2008, Indianola showed its gratitude

and opened the B.B. King Museum.

Every year, tens of thousands of people visit

from all over the world to this little town in Mississippi

to share one of the greatest journeys ever told.

(energetic instrumental music)

- All right, put your hands over her head, please.

(cheering)

Okay, one more time.

(fireworks popping)

- He's one of the most, if not the most,

beloved artists on the planet Earth today.

- He's great in every way.

Just the girth of the man is great.

His big laugh is great.

His big voice is great.

He is.

You know, the only person who doesn't think B.B.'s great

is probably B.B..

- People call me "King of the Blues."

I've heard it many, many times.

Do you think I think that?

No, I do not.

I think it's a lot of people can do exactly what I do,

and a lot of them can do it better.

They're just not me.

* Did you ever hear a church bell tone

* Ever hear a church bell tone

* Did you ever hear a church bell tone

* Then you know that old B. is dead and gone *

- He never forgets his old friends.

If he's aware of a situation with one, or an old band member

who he considers them all family, current and past.

- He cares about people.

He loves people.

- And I think he's the most easiest-going

person I ever seen.

- He wanted to share his talent and his soul with the world.

And that's what he did.

- He's a one of a kind.

- I mean, he's just like, you know?

Unbelievable.

- Infinitely, he's the most producible artist

I've ever worked with.

- He's a master.

Who wouldn't want to work with a master?

- There's only one B.B.

- Well, he's an icon.

I mean, he's absolutely an American blues icon,

and, uh, he might be one of the last

of the really great ones.

- Friedrich Nietzsche, uh, Nietzsche, um,

said, "For true greatness to take place,

"there requires a long obedience in the same direction."

- I can't tell anybody what I want to hear, but I have a...

I hear it myself, but I can't play it.

(laughing) I don't know how to really get it myself.

I think sometimes, the sound that I hear

has never been the sound that I want to hear,

if I make sense.

It is a little sound there that I hear,

but I can't tell anybody about it.

When I hear what I would like to hear, if ever,

I think I'd have to stop, because it probably won't sound

as good as I'm thinking it will.

(laughing)

- I think that as a, as a lesson in living,

you can look at B.B. and also learn what it's like to be

a man, and get through all those difficult times he had,

and come through with the heart that he still has.

It's no mean accomplishment.

- I don't think I've done the best that I could have done.

I thought I had.

I thought that I did everything the best I could,

but when I look back, I see there's some slacks.

You can do better.

- I've never told him, but I sometimes call him

"father of us all,"

because that's the way I see him.

It's very difficult to find words to say.

Excuse me.

- He sang the blues and did a great job of it,

and rose to a greater height where even invited by kings

and potentates, all from where he was.

- I've never met a king before, so I'm a bit nervous,

but also grateful.

So grateful.

Thank you.

(praying in foreign language)

I said, Holy Father, I know you're always doing things

for others, so I want to do something for you, sir.

I said, I'd like to offer my guitar to you.

He took it himself.

He stepped and took it from the guy, and he smiled again.

Then he said, "Happy holidays to you and your family, B.B."

I said, oh my God, he said "B.B."

(laughing)

* Through the night

* Lead me on, Lord

* To the light

* Take my hand *

- Some nights when you wanna go out and just take a walk,

clear your head,

or jump into a car just to take a drive, you can't do it.

Secret Service won't let you, and that's frustrating.

Uh, but then, uh, there are other nights where B.B. King

and Mick Jagger come over to your house

to play for a concert. (audience laughs)

(applause)

* Come on

* Baby, don't you wanna go

* Same ole' place

* Sweet home, Chicago *

(applause)

- Now, it's my honor as Governor of the state of Mississippi

to proclaim February 15th, 2005, as B.B. King Day

for the entire state of Mississippi.

And I urge all citizens to join me and the Legislature

in celebrating and honoring

this great Mississippian.

(applause)

- Only God knows how I feel.

I am so happy, thank you.

(applause)

(slow, sad music)

- Well, the only thing about the blues, when B.B.'s gone,

like everything else, the world goes on.

It's not gon' stop because B.B. King leave,

but it'll never be the same.

But I'm here to tell you, B.B. is leaving a legend that's

gon' be hard to be beat.

- We just got a B.B. King in our life.

And ain't nothing else like him.

- I'm hoping, though, that...

When I start to sounding as bad as I think I will

when I get a certain age,

I hope that, you know, that a little bell will ring

in my head that says, "It's time to stop."

But other than that, I'll wait till the great one upstairs

take me away, 'cause I don't feel bad.

Feel pretty good at 85, so...

Here I am.

That's the best I can answer.

Today at the Homecoming, I saw a little boy in the choir

that remind me so much of little Riley King, me,

you know, moi.

And I almost cried thinking that here he is today.

He didn't have to go through what I went through.

What is it that I could have told him, or could tell you,

that would make the life better for that little guy

that looked like a little Riley King?

Then I smile and think, the sky is the limit.

* Ever, ever, ever, ever, and ever

* I cross my heart *

- [Voiceover] What do you want to do with your music

and with your singing?

- Play the best that I can.

Reach as many people as I can, as many countries.

Otherwords,

I'd like the whole world to be able to hear B.B. King sing

and play the blues.

* I swear by stars above

* I'll keep my word

* My love

* You sitting there lookin' proud and thinking

* you so fine

* You're trying to run around with each and every

* friend of mine

* You're thinking you're so smart, baby,

* and think that I'm a fool

* But baby let me tell you, you'd better play it cool

* 'Cause I'm tired of your jive

* Yes, baby, I'm tired of your jive

* Yes, I refuse to be your fool, woman

* Baby, I'm tired of your jive

* You think that I don't see

* what you do behind my back

* You think that I should love you, woman

* in spite of what you lack

* You'd better pay attention, baby,

* or you might not be around

* You wake up early one morning, baby

* and I'll be done put you down

* 'Cause I'm tired of your jive

* Yes, woman, I'm tired of your jive

* I refuse to be your fool, baby,

* 'cause I'm tired of your jive

* You're sitting there just a-smiling

* and thinking nothing's wrong

* I don't intend to pull your coat, baby,

* you'll know it when I'm gone

* You'll never miss your water, baby,

* till the well runs dry

* Well now, baby, I'm gonna tell you by and by

* I'm tired of your jive, baby

* Yes, you know, I'm tired of your jive

* I say I refuse to be your fool, baby

* I'm tired of your jive

* Lord, I wonder, yes, I wonder

* Do my baby think of me

* Oh, I wonder, Lord, I wonder

* Do my baby think of me

* Now, I wonder, Lord, I wonder

* Will my babe come back to me

* Yeah, she been gone so long,

* just can't stand it no more

* Oh, she been gone so long

* just can't stand it no more

* Now I ain't got nobody

* And no place to go

* Yeah I think when she left me

* Yeah she went to somebody else

* Oh, I think when she left me

* Yeah she went to somebody else

* Now if she don't come back to me soon

* think I'm gonna leave myself