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When I Left Home: My Story
Author(s): Buddy Guy (Author), David Ritz
- Publisher: Da Capo Press Inc
- Publication Date: 8 May 2012
- Language: English
- Print length: 320 pages
- ISBN-10: 9780306819575
- ISBN-13: 9780306819575
Book Description
This is the autobiography of blues legend Buddy Guy. According to Eric Clapton, John Mayer, and the late Stevie Ray Vaughn, Buddy Guy is the greatest blues guitarist of all time. An enormous influence on these musicians as well as Jimi Hendrix, Jimmy Page, and Jeff Beck, Guy is the living embodiment of Chicago Blues. Buddy’s story stands at the absolute nexus of modern blues. He came to Chicago in the fifties at the very moment when urban blues were electrifying our culture. He was a regular session player at Chess Records. Willie Dixon was his mentor. He was a sideman in the bands of Muddy Waters and Howlin’ Wolf. He and Junior Wells formed a band of his own. In the sixties, he became a recording star in his own right. By the seventies, he was opening for the Rolling Stones. “When I Left Home” tells Buddy’s picaresque story in his own unique voice, that of a storyteller who remembers everything, including blues masters in their prime, and the exploding, evolving culture of music that happened all around him. “I want you to know these people like I knew them”, Buddy says. “I want them to jump off the page and talk to you just like they talked to me. Want you to see them for who they really were – crazy wild geniuses, sometimes sweet as pie, sometimes mean as rattle snakes. I’m talking about Muddy, Wolf, Big Mama Thornton, Lightnin’ Hopkins, John Lee Hooker. I’ve lived the story, now I got to tell the story so you can see what I’ve seen, feel what I’ve felt, learn what I’ve learned”.
Editorial Reviews
Review
Buddy Guy was to me what Elvis was for others…. [he] is by far and without a doubt the best guitar player alive. –Eric Clapton
[Buddy Guy] plays from a place that I’ve never heard anyone play. Buddy can go from one end of the spectrum to another. He can play quieter than anybody I’ve ever heard, or wilder and louder than anybody I’ve ever heard –Stevie Ray Vaughn
As is the case with all artists who are sure of their work, Buddy is an absolute gentleman. When I first heard him, I got scared. Musically, he had raised the bar and continues to do so. Buddy has never failed to amaze me first as an artist and secondly as a beautiful guy. I did not give him my guitar for show! I loved that axe, yet I loved what Buddy gave us all even more. Long may he give us his gift. –Keith Richards
About the Author
Buddy Guy was born in in 1936 in Louisiana. Considered among the best blues guitarists alive today, he lives in Chicago. David Ritz is the co-author of many best-selling autobiographies of musicians, including Ray Charles, Etta James, and more. He is the author of Divided Soul, the definitive biography of Marvin Gaye, and lives in Los Angeles.
