At 90 years old, Buddy Guy stands as one of the most influential guitarists in American music. As a Rock & Roll Hall of Fame inductee and a pioneer of Chicago’s explosive West Side sound, Buddy Guy remains a guiding force for generations of rock and blues legends. The nine-time GRAMMY winner has also earned a Lifetime Achievement GRAMMY, 38 Blues Music Awards, the Billboard Century Award, the Presidential National Medal of Arts, and the Kennedy Center Honor. Rolling Stone ranks him #23 on its list of the “100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time,” underscoring his unmatched impact on modern music.
Born in 1936 to a sharecropper’s family in rural Louisiana, Guy arrived in Chicago in 1957 and went on to reshape the sound of the electric guitar through groundbreaking work with Chess Records and influential recordings of his own. His recent achievements include a 2019 GRAMMY win for The Blues Is Alive and Well and the acclaimed PBS American Masters documentary Buddy Guy: The Blues Chase the Blues Away. Today, as he celebrates 90 years, Buddy Guy remains an American music icon—one of the last living architects of the electric blues tradition.
