Live at the Regal

Live at the Regal is a 1965 live album by American blues guitarist and singer B.B. King. It was recorded on November 21, 1964, at the Regal Theater in Chicago. The album is widely heralded as one of the greatest blues albums ever recorded and was ranked at number 141 in Rolling Stone's 2003 edition of the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time list,[6] before dropping to number 299 in a 2020 revision.[7] In 2005, Live at the Regal was selected for permanent preservation in the National Recording Registry at the Library of Congress in the United States.

Live at the Regal
Live album by
B.B. King
Released1965
RecordedNovember 21, 1964
VenueRegal Theater, Chicago, Illinois
GenreBlues
Length34:46
LabelABC
ProducerJohnny Pate
B.B. King chronology
My Kind of Blues
(1961)		 Live at the Regal
(1965)		 Confessin' the Blues
(1966)
Professional ratings
Review scores
SourceRating
AllMusic[1]
The Encyclopedia of Popular Music[2]
MusicHound Blues[3]
The Penguin Guide to Blues Recordings + “crown”[4]
The Rolling Stone Jazz Record Guide[5]

Carlos Santana, Eric Clapton, John Mayer and Mark Knopfler are among musicians who have used the album as a primer before performances.

The album was included in Robert Christgau's "Basic Record Library" of 1950s and 1960s recordings—published in Christgau's Record Guide: Rock Albums of the Seventies (1981)[8]—and in Robert Dimery's 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die.[9]

It was voted number 604 in Colin Larkin's All Time Top 1000 Albums 3rd Edition (2000).[10] In the same book it was number 6 in the Top 50 Blues albums of All-Time.

Recording

Live at the Regal was recorded on November 21, 1964, at the Regal Theater in Chicago, a venue King claimed to have played at "hundreds of times before".[11] King's backing band consisted of: Duke Jethro on the piano, Leo Lauchie on the bass, Kenneth Sands on the trumpet, Johnny Board and Bobby Forte on the tenor saxes, and Sonny Freeman on the drums.[11] Jethro was originally scheduled to play the organ, but after his organ broke, King instructed Jethro to play the piano.[12] When Jethro said he did not know how to play the piano, King replied "Well, just sit there and pretend — that's what you do most of the time anyway!"[12]

Track listing

Side one

  1. "Every Day I Have the Blues" (Memphis Slim) – 2:38
  2. "Sweet Little Angel" (Riley King, Jules Taub) – 4:12
  3. "It's My Own Fault" (John Lee Hooker) – 3:29
  4. "How Blue Can You Get" (Jane Feather) – 3:44
  5. "Please Love Me" (King, Jules Taub) – 3:01

Side two

  1. "You Upset Me Baby" (Joe Josea, Maxwell Davis) – 2:22
  2. "Worry, Worry" (Davis Plumber, Taub) – 6:24
  3. "Woke Up This Mornin'" (King) – 1:45
  4. "You Done Lost Your Good Thing Now" (King, Josea) – 4:16
  5. "Help the Poor" (Charlie Singleton) – 2:58

Personnel
  • B.B. King – guitar, vocals
  • Leo Lauchie – bass
  • Duke Jethro – piano
  • Sonny Freeman – drums
  • Bobby Forte, Johnny Board – tenor saxophone
  • Kenny "Kenneth" Sands – trumpet
  • E. Rodney Jones, Pervis Spann – presenters

Technical

  • Ron Steele Sr. – recording engineer
  • Don Bronstein – cover

Charts
Chart (2014–15) Peak
position
Australian Albums (ARIA)[13] 75
German Albums (Offizielle Top 100)[14] 85
Swiss Albums (Schweizer Hitparade)[15] 44
UK Albums (OCC)[16] 96
United States (Billboard)[17] 56

References
  1. Gioffre, Daniel (n.d.). "B.B. King - Live at the Regal". AllMusic. Retrieved September 6, 2019.
  2. Larkin, Colin (2011). The Encyclopedia of Popular Music (5th ed.). Omnibus Press. p. 3074. ISBN 978-0857125958.
  3. Rucker, Leland (2002). MusicHound Blues: The Essential Album Guide (2 ed.). Visible Ink Press. p. 227. ISBN 978-1578-5903-0-8. B.B.'s vocal-like guitar playing is part and parcel of his rare ability to communicate intimately with an audience, a powerful rapport which is perfectly captured on Live at the Regal, a 1964 performance considered by many to be not only his finest recording but the greatest album in all modern blues.
  4. Russell, Tony; Smith, Chris (2006). The Penguin Guide to Blues Recordings. Penguin. p. 355. ISBN 978-0-140-51384-4.
  5. Swenson, J., ed. (1985). The Rolling Stone Jazz Record Guide. Rolling Stone. p. 118. ISBN 0-394-72643-X.
  6. "500 Greatest Albums of All Time Rolling Stone's definitive list of the 500 greatest albums of all time". Rolling Stone. 2012. Retrieved September 18, 2019.
  7. "The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time". Rolling Stone. 2020-09-22. Retrieved 2021-08-02.
  8. Christgau, Robert (1981). "A Basic Record Library: The Fifties and Sixties". Christgau's Record Guide: Rock Albums of the Seventies. Ticknor & Fields. ISBN 0899190251. Retrieved March 16, 2019 – via robertchristgau.com.
  9. ^ Robert Dimery; Michael Lydon (23 March 2010). 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die: Revised and Updated Edition. Universe. ISBN 978-0-7893-2074-2.
  10. Colin Larkin, ed. (2000). All Time Top 1000 Albums (3rd ed.). Virgin Books. p. 201. ISBN 0-7535-0493-6.
  11. McGee, David (2005). B.B. King: There is Always One More Time. Hal Leonard Corporation. p. 130. ISBN 978-0-8793-0843-8.
  12. "Valley man who was organist for BB King remembers the music legend". KFSN-TV. May 18, 2015. Retrieved September 6, 2019.
  13. "The ARIA Report" (PDF). ARIA Charts. May 25, 2015. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2015-06-03. Retrieved September 6, 2019.
  14. "Offiziellecharts.de – B.B. King – His Definitive Greatest Hits" (in German). GfK Entertainment Charts. Retrieved 15 August 2019.
  15. "Swisscharts.com – B.B. King – Live at the Regal". Hung Medien. Retrieved 2015-05-24.
  16. "BB King | Artist | Official Charts". UK Albums Chart. Retrieved 2015-05-24.
  17. "B.B. King Chart History - Billboard 200". Billboard. Archived from the original on November 19, 2018. Retrieved September 6, 2019.
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