YEAR
2005
INDUCTED BY
B.B. King & Eric Clapton (Cream, The Yardbirds)
CATEGORY
Performers
If you cut Buddy Guy open he would bleed blue.
His guitar-playing style was so visceral, so ferocious, that the blues had to be running through his veins. Guitarist giants such as Eric Clapton, Jimi Hendrix and Stevie Ray Vaughan cite him as an influence.
Buddy Guy
HALL OF FAME
ESSAY
By Rob Bowman
In 1986 Eric Clapton emphatically declared that “[Buddy Guy is] without a doubt the best guitar player alive.”
Over the years, Carlos Santana, Jeff Beck, Jimi Hendrix, Stevie Ray Vaughn and numerous lesser lights have similarly sung Buddy Guy’s praises. The Rolling Stones requested Guy and his erstwhile partner, harmonica wizard Junior Wells, to open for them on their 1970 European tour, while everyone from Mark Knopfler to Bonnie Raitt and Johnny Lang has lined up for guest slots on Guy’s string of incendiary Silvertone albums from 1991 to the present.
