B.B. King

Year:
1987
Inducted by:
Sting (The Police)
Category:
Performers

Introduction

Bow down to the King of the Blues.

Throughout B.B. King’s fifty-year career of new influences, collaboration and incessant touring, the blues have been his home. He came up in a time of racial divide, uniting us with music that served as a reminder—we all have the blues.

Sting Inducts B.B. King

Sting Inducts B.B. King at the 1987 Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony

Sting Inducts B.B. King

00:00:58
B.B. King Acceptance Speech

00:01:38
"The Thrill Is Gone"

00:05:54
Eric Clapton and B.B. King Induct Buddy Guy

00:07:49

Hall of Fame Essay

1987

Michael Hill

Riley “B. B.” King has often been called the King of the Blues, but given his wide-ranging and long-lasting influence, he might more accurately be described as the blues’ lifetime ambassador.

He has brought the sound and the style across the U.S.A. and all the way to the U.S.S.R., to Caesar’s Palace and the Cook County Jail, to the Newport Jazz Festival and the Fillmore East.

He topped the rhythm and blues charts in the early Fifties, served as an inspiration to the blues-obsessed guitarists of the Sixties and reached a mainstream audience, as well as the pop Top Twenty, with his elegant and soulful “The Thrill Is Gone.”