Quotes by B. B. King

B. B. King

American singer-songwriter, guitarist, and record producer

Alive from: 1925-2015

Category: Music | Movie | Writers (Contemporary)

Quotes 1 till 15 of 49.

• B. B. King

  

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  'She's Dynamite' was a 100 years ago, and I recorded that song because the company thought that it was a great song and it was hot. That was the beginning of rock n' roll, and I guess they thought it would be a BB King version of rock n' roll.

• B. B. King

  

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  A lot of people believe what other people say.

• B. B. King

  

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  As for my band, well, my mentors were Duke Ellington, Benny Goodman, Jimmie Lunceford, and no one had a band more smartly dressed than Duke.

• B. B. King

  

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  Back when we was in school in Mississippi, we had Little Black Sambo. That's what you learned: Anytime something was not good, or anytime something was bad in some kinda way, it had to be called black. Like, you had Black Monday, Black Friday, black sheep... Of course, everything else, all the good stuff, is white. White Christmas and such.

• B. B. King

  

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  Being a blues singer is like being black two times.
  Source: The Wit and Wisdom of Rock and Roll, ed. Maxim Jabukowski (1983)

• B. B. King

  

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  Blues is a tonic for whatever ails you. I could play the blues and then not be blue anymore.

• B. B. King

  

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  Cotton was a force of nature. There's a poetry to it, hoeing and growing cotton.

• B. B. King

  

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  Everybody wants to go to Heaven, but no one wants to die to get there!

• B. B. King

  

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  Everything I record, I just try to sound like me and come up with songs that suit what I do and then just go for it. I never know what the public's going to like, anyway.

• B. B. King

  

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  Growing up on the plantation there in Mississippi, I would work Monday through Saturday noon. I'd go to town on Saturday afternoons, sit on the street corner, and I'd sing and play.

• B. B. King

  

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  Growing up, I was taught that a man has to defend his family. When the wolf is trying to get in, you gotta stand in the doorway.

• B. B. King

  

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  I don't think anybody steals anything; all of us borrow.

• B. B. King

  

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  I'm no good with chords. I'm horrible with chords.

• B. B. King

  

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  I'm trying to get people to see that we are our brother's keeper. Red, white, black, brown or yellow, rich or poor, we all have the blues.

• B. B. King

  

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  I've always tried to defend the idea that the blues doesn't have to be sung by a person who comes from Mississippi, as I did.