B.B. King — one of the most influential blues singer/songwriters and electric guitarists of the 20th century — first honed his chops with a gig at a famous cafe in West Memphis, Arkansas. But he never would have gotten that job without a gig on the radio.
In this episode of Sound Bites, the late icon recalls his journey to Miss Annie's, a club where people went to gamble and dance back when B.B. King was coming up in the blues scene. He played the club one night on the recommendation of blues harmonica player Sonny Boy Williamson, a regular performer at Miss Annie's, and a musician that King would go on to collaborate with throughout his life.
"My job was to keep the young people happy, man. Keep ‘em dancing," King remembers. "There were some of the prettiest girls I’d ever seen in my life."
So when the proprietor, Miss Annie, asked him if he wanted to make the job a regular thing, of course he agreed. She made King an offer for six days a week, provided he could find some work on the radio. So, he walked up to a new radio station called WDIA — the first station in the U.S. to program exclusively for Black listeners — and declared, "I wanna make a record and go on the radio."
"[The man who answered the door] said, 'Well, we don’t make records, but you probably could go on the radio,'" King remembers. The station programmers told him about a new product called Peptikon, which was being billed as a medicinal tonic, and asked King if he could write a jingle. "Yeah, I can write a jingle. I’d do anything to go on the radio," he replied.
So he did — and both the ad and the product were successful. "And I didn’t find out until about 10 or 15 years ago why. It was about 12% alcohol," King concludes with a laugh. "Anyway, that’s how I got on the radio, and I had a good time."
Press play on the video above to watch King tell the full story — and sing a brief rendition of his Peptikon jingle — and keep checking GRAMMY.com for more new episodes of Sound Bites.
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