B. B. King

I tell my children now that they are older, 'If something happens to me... don't make no big fuss over me. Don't make no big expense on my funeral. Don't put any pressure on the rest of the family. I've loved everybody, and I hope they loved me. But don't create this big expense for the family.' ”

I was a regular hand when I was 7. I picked cotton. I drove tractors. Children grew up not thinking that this is what they must do. We thought this was the thing to do to help your family. ”

When you don't have much money, you worry that they'll just put you in the ground someplace and your loved ones won't know where you are. ”

The blues was like that problem child that you may have had in the family. You was a little bit ashamed to let anybody see him, but you loved him. You just didn't know how other people would take it. ”

I have a nice car, a Mercedes. And then I have an old El Camino truck that I'm crazy about. I like to get in that truck and go up in the hills near where I live, in Vegas, and take my camera. That, to me, is Heaven, being out in nature, taking pictures of the wildlife. ”

Cotton was a force of nature. There's a poetry to it, hoeing and growing cotton. ”

What don't I want to learn? I have how-to books, history, nature. Ain't nobody here saying, 'You'd better learn this.' But I still think I've got a head on my shoulders, and it pleases me. ”

I wanted to connect my guitar to human emotions. ”

I would sit on the street corners in my hometown of Indianola, Mississippi, and I would play. And, generally, I would start playing gospel songs. People would come by on the street - you live in Time Square, you know how they do it - they would bunch up. And they would always compliment me on gospel tunes, but they would tip me when I played blues. ”

Once in a while, the thumb that fits over the neck of the guitar kinda bothers me a little bit, but not that much yet. I figure in time I won't do much because of my age. ”