His last appearance in the charts was 1989. King first charted in 1951. King was around 26 years old when his first singled charted. The Ultimate Collection collects B.B.s legendary hits and signature songs between 19, from his first hit, Three OClock Blues to his recordings with Eric Clapton and U2.24 Song Chart Appearances. His most successful album.The King Of The Blues celebrates his 80th Birthday later this year, and Universal kicks off a year long celebration with the most complete single disc B.B. Today, King, who once made 35 cents a day picking cotton, is a multimillionaire as a result of his music.

The blues legend everyone admired. The man who made his guitar express every imaginable blues emotion. Within the blues community he was 'The King of the Blues' but while people like Chuck Berry were busy having hits, BB King was watching others embrace his style and achieve levels of fame that he could only dream about.It is a comment on King's career that slowly he began to insinuate himself into the heart of rock music and popular culture so that by the time of his death he was as important to popular music as Louis Armstrong had been to jazz.He was the great exponent of the blues.

Clapton was so powerfully influenced by King's relaxed, but deeply emotional and deeply felt, style that in 2000 he recorded a blues album with King titled Riding With The King. In 1969 this British obsession was compounded when King toured as the opening act with The Rolling Stones on their American tour of that year.3. It was only a short step to the blues-obsessed British guitar players and in 1967, when he was only 22 and touring the US with Cream, Eric Clapton not only bowed to King's great blues guitar style but actually played with the man. The answer: 'By copying BB's licks' drove fans to a musician who African-American audiences already knew and loved.2. He first came to the attention of rock 'n' roll audiences in 1965 when Mike Bloomfield, the guitarist with the Butterfield Blues Band, playing on the band's debut album, was asked how he had learned to play.

And he was kind of quiet, shy, he didn't open up too much, but there were questions as we all ask each other. He recalled: 'I met him when he was playing with Little Richard. Although he always believed that Jimi Hendrix had his own unique sound, BB King did admit that he had taught Hendrix when he was still a very young man. One of the greatest was Stevie Ray Vaughan, a white musician from Texas whose style, heavily borrowed from King, was to influence a generation of blues-inspired guitarists.6. Literally hundreds of budding rock 'n 'roll and R&B musicians learned soulful 'emotion' from King.

Bb King Songs