Compared to unrelated contemporaries B.B. and Albert King, Freddie King has received considerably less recognition, especially among newer blues fans.\u00a0 That said, the \u201cTexas Cannonball\u201d is still mentioned in many Best Guitarist lists, and his body of work served as a great template for some of the \u201860s and \u201870s\u2019 leading rock and blues musicians.<\/p>\n
There is still some confusion as to Freddie King\u2019s birth name.\u00a0 But most have him born as Frederick Christian on September 3, 1934, son of Gilmer, Texas residents J.T. Christian and Ella May King.\u00a0 Freddie started learning how to play the guitar at the age of six, and by 1952, his family had moved to Chicago\u2019s South Side, where the would-be blues giant would hone his chops and contribute to the city\u2019s burgeoning blues scene.\u00a0 It has been said that Freddie adopted the surname King in the mid-\u201850s as a tribute to B.B. King.<\/p>\n
Exposed to the likes of Muddy Waters, Howlin\u2019 Wolf and Sonny Boy Williamson, King soon became a fixture in the Chicago club scene.\u00a0 Still, he received numerous rejections from Chicago\u2019s leading \u201crace music\u201d label, Chess Records, thus failing to join his musical idols on the same label.\u00a0 He did sign with Federal Records in 1960, and it was there where he recorded some of his most enduring numbers, including \u201cYou\u2019ve Got to Love Her with a Feeling\u201d, \u201cThe Stumble\u201d and \u201cHide Away.\u201d King was as adept on lead vocals as he was on the guitar, and he would also go on tour on occasion for R&B singers such as Sam Cooke and James Brown.<\/p>\n
After his stint with Federal Records, King would sign with Atlantic Records subsidiary Cotillion, recording two albums produced by legendary saxophonist King Curtis in 1969 and 1970.\u00a0 Following Cotillion, King signed with Shelter Records, where his connection with pianist\/singer (and Shelter owner) Leon Russell gave him a solid backing band of session veterans.\u00a0 King recorded three albums under Shelter in the early \u201870s, then moved on to RSO, where he recorded 1974\u2019s Burglar<\/em>, an album produced by the legendary Tom Dowd.\u00a0 Burglar<\/em> showed a different side of Freddie King, as he was now tackling more funk-oriented material, but retaining his natural feel for the blues.<\/p>\n Unfortunately, the busy life of a touring musician was taking its toll on King by the time the mid-\u201870s rolled around.\u00a0 Poor eating habits and drinking were also playing a part in King\u2019s physical decline, and by 1976, he began to suffer from stomach problems.\u00a0 Only 42 years old, King passed away on December 28, 1976 from acute pancreatitis.<\/p>\n The ultimate form of recognition finally came this year, when Freddie King entered the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.\u00a0 And as mentioned, he\u2019s influenced many of the greats with his unique fusion of Texas and Chicago blues styles.\u00a0 His influence can be heard on the works of guitarists like Eric Clapton (who covered \u201cHide Away\u201d with John Mayall and the Bluesbreakers in 1966), Stevie Ray and Jimmie Vaughan and many other blues-influenced musicians then and now.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Compared to unrelated contemporaries B.B. and Albert King, Freddie King has received considerably less recognition, especially among newer blues fans.\u00a0 That said, the \u201cTexas Cannonball\u201d is still mentioned in many Best Guitarist lists, and his body of work served as a great template for some of the \u201860s and \u201870s\u2019 leading rock and blues musicians. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pgc_meta":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[8,31],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.thebluesguitarplayer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/634"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.thebluesguitarplayer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.thebluesguitarplayer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.thebluesguitarplayer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.thebluesguitarplayer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=634"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/www.thebluesguitarplayer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/634\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":637,"href":"http:\/\/www.thebluesguitarplayer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/634\/revisions\/637"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.thebluesguitarplayer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=634"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.thebluesguitarplayer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=634"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.thebluesguitarplayer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=634"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}