Riley B King's Major Accomplishments

Riley B. King had many nicknames, the most well-known being B.B. King which stood for “Blues Boy.” King was born on September 16th, 1925 in Itta Bena, Mississippi. His parents divorced when he was five years of age and his mother died when he turned nine years old, which caused him to have to be raised by his grandmother. This put a heavy strain on his education and was one of the many reasons he dropped out of school in the tenth grade to become a cotton picker making only a penny a pound. However, he made this life style work and decided to begin his music career. B.B. King’s career began in 1948. When he was 23 years old, King was given the opportunity to perform on Sonny Boy Williamson’s radio show on KWEM located in Memphis, Tennessee.

The people that influenced King to begin playing these rock concerts include: Eric Clapton, Jimi Hendrix, and the Rolling Stones. He moved to New York and got a new manager named Sid Seidenberg who helped him through a rough time in his life. King enjoyed gambling and Seidenberg helped him to overcome his bad habit and got him to play at larger concerts and venues to become even more famous than he already was. In 1968, King landed a gig at the Newport Folk Festival where he would perform with some of the most famous musicians of his time. This led to him opening up for the Rolling Stones at over fifteen concerts. He was idolized by many of the artists performing at Newport Folk Festival and invited by some of them to play at their concerts. This is what turned him onto playing for mostly white audiences. Then by 1970, King received a Grammy for his hit single “The Thrill is Gone.” Later on into the seventies, King began recording albums with other people, one example being Bobby Bland and Stevie Wonder. With his longtime friend, Bobby Bland, he created “Together for the First Time live” in 1974 as well as “Together Again live” in

Bush for all of his hard work and commitment. King also would hold meet and greets to meet fans and teach them how to play the guitar on his free time. He knew he was not the same as he was before but still wanted to be active in his fans lives and help them out as much as possible. King was stubborn though and if he was supposed to perform somewhere, he would be there to perform, whether he was physical and mentally able to or