George “Buddy” Guy, one of the most dazzling performers in blues history, was born in Lettsworth on July 30, 1936. His primary influences included local Louisiana musicians and many more born across the river in Mississippi, including B.B. King, Guitar Slim, Muddy Waters, and John Lee Hooker. Like his idol B.B. King, he rose from humble beginnings as a sharecropper’s son; the Guy family lived in a house on the Feduccia family’s Three Rivers Landing plantation, and his father, Sam Guy, bought him his first guitar from fieldhand Henry “Coot” Smith, who showed him how to play John Lee Hooker’s “Boogie Chillen,” already a favorite record in the Guy household. Further inspired by Lightnin’ Slim, he began playing in Baton Rouge with “Big Poppa” Tilley and Raful Neal, while the flamboyance of Eddie “Guitar Slim” Jones left a lasting impression. After recording a demo tape on May 30, 1957, for WXOK DJ “Diggie Doo” Meaders, who sent it to Ace Records in Jackson, Guy left home on September 25, 1957, after working as a utility man at LSU, and went to Chicago seeking better work and a music career. There he entered a blues scene dominated by transplanted Southerners, especially Mississippians; Otis Rush and Muddy Waters were among the first to encourage him, and Willie Dixon supervised most of his early recording sessions for the Artistic and Chess labels. His incendiary performances electrified audiences in Chicago and on tour, and he also became a versatile accompanist, recording behind Muddy Waters and other Mississippi-born bluesmen, including Eddie Boyd, Honeyboy Edwards, John Lee Hooker, Walter Horton, Son House, Howlin’ Wolf, Sunnyland Slim, Jesse Fortune, and Sonny Boy Williamson No. 2 in the 1960s. Among his classic early records were “Stone Crazy,” which briefly reached the Billboard charts in 1962, several Willie Dixon compositions, and “My Time After While.” Although major recording success eluded him for decades, he often teamed with Junior Wells and sometimes appeared with B.B. King or rock stars he had influenced, including Eric Clapton, Jimi Hendrix, and Stevie Ray Vaughan. He also enriched the Chicago scene by opening the Checkerboard Lounge in 1972 and Buddy Guy’s Legends in 1989, providing venues for fellow blues artists. His breakthrough came in 1991 with Damn Right, I’ve Got the Blues, the first of many albums to reach the Billboard charts. Sweet Tea, his first album to reach No. 1 on the Billboard blues charts in 2001, and Blues Singer, both filled with his renditions of Mississippi blues, were recorded in Oxford, Mississippi. The Blues Is Alive and Well, another No. 1 blues album in 2018, featured him back in Lettsworth, reflecting a legendary bluesman who never forgot his roots and the people who nurtured his talent.
