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When Young Elvis Met B.B. King
- janandonly 5y agoI don't know why but it warms my hearth to hear BB speak so highly of Elvis Presley.
- JKCalhoun 5y ago"I sensed something was going on when he played a show in Richmond, Virginia (June 30, 1956). It was a pretty straight Southern town and you had a lot of young girls there, maybe 4,000 in the theatre. The girls would be hugging each other in the darkness and would cry." – Alfred Wertheimer (early Elvis photographer) I read an interview with Al where he was asked if all the crying was legit — or was it just "Elvis mania" or whatever. He said it absolutely was real. He explained that these young women had been side-lined, repressed by society at large and Elvis had touched off something in them.
- bamboozled 5y agoThey probably saw a sense of freedom and rebellion in him that was exciting. Gave them hope they wouldn’t just be house wives or whatever their prior destiny told them.
- JKCalhoun 5y agoYes, that is how I understood it as well.
- soperj 5y agoIt's kind of weird, because if you listen to old recordings of BB King when he was younger, there are clearly plenty of girls in the audience and they go absolutely nuts.
- anonymousiam 5y agoBB outlived Elvis by 37 years. Both are irreplaceable.
- AlbertCory 5y agoFavorite story, at least for today: When he was a show biz legend, U2 had him in the studio to record with them. Bono showed a song to him, and said "Now in this part, B.B., you just play chords." King said, "Gentlemen, I don't play chords. I do this:" and then did his signature guitar soloing.
- adventured 5y agoKing also mentions that here (When Love Comes to Town): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7mCE73j59Zs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7mCE73j59Zs
- AlbertCory 5y agohttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P3qfTk730Cw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P3qfTk730Cw "Now I'm a man. I spell M. A. N." I always thought that technical presentations should be given the way blues stars enter -- have your warmup band play a few songs to get the crowd fired up, and THEN the main guys enters with the presentation they all came for. Gotta have that buildup.
- quercusa 5y agoI saw BB at Shoreline in the mid 90s. More than anyone else I've ever seen, it was clear that his priority was that the audience have a good time. We certainly did.