Buddy Guy

Buddy Guy is synonymous with Chicago blues, but he's from rural Lettsworth, Louisiana, where he grew up working the land in a family of sharecroppers. He moved to Chicago in 1957 when he was 21.

Guy was heralded in the world of blues but little known outside that genre until the '90s, when some of his famous admirers appeared on his albums and talked him up. In that decade, he released a string of Grammy-winning albums with contributions from Mark Knopfler, Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck, Bonnie Raitt, Travis Tritt and Jonny Lang. Clapton and B.B. King inducted him into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2005.

His family didn't get electricity until Buddy was 12, but when they did, one of their first appliances was a record player. Fortunately for Buddy, his dad loved blues music and got some 78 RPM records his son listened to over and over. One in particular had a huge impact on Buddy: "Boogie Chillen" by John Lee Hooker.