Originally a Delta bluesman in the vein of Son House, Muddy Waters moved north in the 1940s and became the leader of the first--and greatest--electric Chicago blues band. Waters' abrasive guitar, impassioned singing, and commanding stage presence ins…

The great Memphis guitarist and singer B.B. King has been the most high-profile figure in blues since the 1960s, ever since his LIVE AT THE REGAL album established him as a superstar. King has collaborated successfully with everyone from Bobby Bland …

Howlin' Wolf's menacing, guttural vocals are among the blues' most distinctive sounds. His repertoire, much of which flowed from the pen of Willie Dixon, is equally classic. Wolf, Muddy Waters, and Sonny Boy Williamson make up the Holy Trinity of Chi…

Eric Clapton once called Buddy Guy "the greatest blues guitarist ever." Guy, along with contemporary Magic Sam, took the sounds of Chicago blues of the 1950s and ratcheted them up a notch, in the process creating a new form of controlled blues mayhem…

Robert Johnson is the most legendary of Delta blues singers, and while the facts of his real life are scarce, tall tales abound--most commonly that he sold his soul to the devil in order to master the guitar. Johnson invested his music with frighteni…

Elmore James built a blues career largely around one milestone slide-guitar lick, but what a lick it was! Copped from Robert Johnson's "Dust My Broom," James's frantic trademark run can safely be cited as one of the cornerstones of rock & roll, from …

Albert King is one of the most important post-war blues guitarists. His influence was even more profoundly felt in the rock world than in blues, though he earned iconic stature in both. His unusual style came from playing pickless, upside-down, and l…

Over the course of four decades, Eric Clapton has carried the British blues legacy into the mainstream of pop music. From his mid-1960s days with the Yardbirds and John Mayall, through his years as guitar god with Cream and Blind Faith, and eventuall…

Bob Dylan began as a Woody Guthrie acolyte, imitating the dust-bowl balladeer as faithfully as a baby boomer from Hibbing, Minnesota, could. It wasn't long before he found his own voice, spearheading the early-1960s folk revival as well as the singer…

There are few musicians in modern pop music who can truly be called "genius," but in the case of Ray Charles, the term applies. His innovative singing, drawing on both gospel and pop, has inspired legions of great singers. With a long, prolific recor…

Of all the artists to emerge in the late 1960s, none inspired greater awe than Jimi Hendrix. After touring with numerous R&B bands, the guitarist moved to London in 1966 and assembled the Jimi Hendrix Experience. His U.S. return at the Monterey Pop F…

In the 1980s, many assumed blues rock was left for dead, but Stevie Ray Vaughan helped breath life back into it. More than a straight-ahead bluesman, Texas-native Vaughan was influenced as much by Jimi Hendrix as he was by Otis Rush, and the singer/…

A self-proclaimed man among men (and deservedly so), singer/guitarist Bo Diddley is still the only musician in history to have a beat named after him. Diddley's raunchy, distorted 1950s sound and African-derived rhythm have been an enormous influence…

Many would agree that without Chuck Berry, there would not have been rock 'n' roll. Berry's 1955 debut single, "Maybellene," was an energetic smash hit, and led to a slew of successful late-'50s songs. Influencing such future big names as the Beatles…

Some artists are influential because so many followers try to imitate them; others are influential precisely because they cannot be imitated. Lightnin' Hopkins was of the latter variety. With a career that stretched from the 1920s through the '70s, t…

Sometimes known as Sonny Boy Williamson II, bluesman Rice Miller took his musical moniker from another blues singer who used it first, though Miller was the best-known Sonny Boy Williamson. He began performing in the 1920s, but the Mississippi singer…

Though Californian belter Etta James is widely known as one of the greatest blues singers, famed for her '60s Chess recordings and '70s Muscle Shoals work, her story is bigger than that. She started out with the Johnny Otis band in the '50s as a hard…

Originally part of the early 1960s British blues/R&B scene, the Rolling Stones rapidly ascended the heights of fame with a perfect combination of hit singles and media-grabbing scandals. By the '70s, Keith Richards had become a bona fide guitar hero,…

Texas blues master Albert Collins was known for his unique Telecaster style, typified by extensive use of reverb, staccato picking, unconventional minor-key tunings, and a percussive, trebly quality. For four decades, from the 1950s on, his "cool" so…

Johnny Cash was part rockabilly rebel, part campfire storyteller, part outlaw in black. Cash made country and rockabilly history on the Sun label in the 1950s. During the '60s, the ruggedly charismatic Cash rose to superstardom, ending the decade wit…