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Buddy Guy Turns 90: The Bluesman on Fear, Family and Why He Never Listens to His Own Music
Ahead of his milestone birthday — and a star-studded Radio City show with Eric Clapton and John Mayer — the legend talks to AARP
VIDEO: How Buddy Guy Is Keeping Blues Alive After 70 Years
AARP Studios/Getty Images
Over his more than 70 years in the business, Buddy Guy, who turns 90 on July 30, has recorded iconic blues albums, played with the great guitarists of the rock era, appeared in a crucial role in Ryan Coogler’s hit film Sinners, and has scooped up nine Grammy awards and a Lifetime Achievement Award, the National Medal of Arts and the Kennedy Center Honors along the way.
He continues to record and tour, and this fall will play to an already sold-out crowd at Radio City Music Hall in New York in a special birthday concert with Eric Clapton, 81, John Mayer and Derek Trucks. Guy slowed down — for a beat — to talk with AARP about what he loves more than playing the guitar, what his grandkids teach him and what keeps him hopeful.
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This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
You accepted the role in Sinners in part because of your kids and your grandkids. What did they tell you that made up your mind?
They probably know more than I did about the movie thing, that you’ll be more exposed by doing this than anything else. Whatever it takes to help the blues stay alive.
What’s your secret to keeping a close family?
I’m from Louisiana. I love cooking — better than I do playing the guitar. When they come over to my house, I have to hide my food because they won’t leave that much for me. And I’ll say, “Why don’t you cook?” and they’ll say, “Granddad, I can’t cook like you.”
Blues legend Buddy Guy sits for a portrait in March at Buddy Guy’s Legends, his blues club in Chicago. The bluesman will celebrate turning 90 this year with a special birthday concert at New York’s Radio City Music Hall in October.
Joshua Lott
What’s your secret to longevity?
I don’t overdo things. Some of the older guys — Muddy Waters, Howlin’ Wolf, Lightnin’ Hopkins — they used to tell me, “Don’t overdo it.” If you overeat, you’re gonna make yourself sick. If you overdrink, you’re gonna get drunk. So I learned how to limit whatever I do. I was born on a farm. I didn’t know what running water was until I was 17 years old. I still got those old-fashioned ways that I’m going to live with for the rest of my life.
I read that you once said, “When I pick up my guitar, I feel like I’m 14.” Does it still give you that feeling today?
You know, [when] you’re 90 years old, you can’t feel like that anymore. But I enjoy it. As long as people enjoy me playing, I’m gonna give you the best I got.… I think I owe you whatever you paid for if you come to see me play.
You performed on NPR’s Tiny Desk Concerts in February with musician and actor Miles Caton, who plays the younger Sammie in Sinners. Are these younger guys studying your blues style?
Guy’s latest album, “Ain’t Done With the Blues,” is his 20th LP to date, and debuted at No. 1 on Billboard’s Blues chart last year.
Courtesy RCA Records
Everything I learned from somebody else. I guess somebody [else] looks at my playing like I did B.B. King, Lightnin’ Hopkins and T-Bone Walker. And I guess what goes around comes around. By the way, I don’t ever listen to Buddy Guy, because I can’t learn nothing from him. I have to listen to other people so I can get [new] ideas.
You’ve talked about performing for kings and queens. Do you still get nervous?
Yes, and not only [for] kings and queens. Because if I don’t see a smile on your face, I don’t think I’m pleasing you. Before I got into music, I felt the same way when I was driving a tractor. I felt I wasn’t driving good enough until the boss come tell me, “You did a pretty good job.”
What advice do you give young people looking to break into music?
It’s like a prizefighter. If you lay down, you can’t win. Don’t give up. If you give up, you ain’t gonna never win. That’s what happened to me. I just kept playing. I drove a tow truck eight hours a day and then went and played my guitar in Chicago for two or three dollars a night. Sometimes I didn’t get that.
Guy performs at the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival in 2022. “As long as people enjoy me playing, I’m gonna give you the best I got,” he says.
Amy Harris/Invision/AP
When I saw you on your 89th birthday at Legend’s club in Chicago, you were surrounded by family and friends and seemed very happy. Does contentment make it hard to play the blues?
When you are doing this for a living, you do it for the people who pay to see you. So you worry about them more than you do yourself. I look out there and I make the lights come on and I say, “I want to watch some faces so I can see they got frowns on the face or a smile.” And I’ll try to hit some licks on the guitar, and sometimes it works.
What keeps you hopeful nowadays?
I’m still not on crutches yet, and I still can let some people know who Muddy Waters was, B.B. King and people like that, because I always do that when I go play. I play more of their music than I do my own. When you come see me, you’re gonna hear me do a Muddy or try to do a B.B. King as close as I can.
You’ve said you were always shy. Was that a problem early in your career?
I’ve been fired once in my life. It was the first time I got a chance to play music. I was pumping gas at a Louisiana service station, and a guy came and asked me how much I made, and he found out I could play. He said, “I can pay you a little more than what you make here if you come and play at this club.” And he got me at that club, I think it must have been about 14 or 15 people. And I said, “Well, I’m gonna sing, but I got to turn my back to the audience,” because I was too shy. He said, “No, you got to turn around.” I said, “Not tonight.” And he fired me. Some friends heard about it, and they told me how to drink [a] glass of wine, and I’ve been [facing the audience] ever since.
Guy performs in Staines, England, in 1969, alongside a young, watchful guitarist named Eric Clapton.
David Redfern/Redferns/Getty Images
What’s the best advice you can give someone?
I didn’t think that I was good enough. I was listening to other people [who were] so good, I was saying, “I ain’t ever gonna be that good.” So I’d assume I’d make a fool out of myself. But they kept telling me, “You are better than you think you are.”
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