Thankfully, Friday\u2019s up-and-down \u201cBG90\u201d tour stop here was less uneven than Guy\u2019s 2023 show at the same venue. He was in strong voice throughout, whether belting out the show-opening \u201cDamn Right, I\u2019ve Got The Blues\u201d with searing intensity, romping through the innuendo-filled 1971 Bobby Rush chestnut, \u201cChickenheads,\u201d or sizzling during an oh-so-sultry version of the 1956 Little Willie John\u2019s classic, \u201cFever.\u201d<\/p>\n
Guy\u2019s instrumental work remains a more challenging proposition.<\/p>\n
One of the most fiery and original guitarists of the past 70 years, he has profoundly influenced numerous other six-string practitioners, past and present. They include Jimi Hendrix, Eric Clapton, Stevie Ray Vaughan, John Mayer, Marcus King, Quinn Sullivan, Ally Venable and Ingram, whose sublime opening set Friday was a marvel of skill, pacing, deep feeling and finely calibrated precision.<\/p>\n
All these guitarists have been inspired by Guy\u2019s searing tone, the galvanizing physicality of his playing, his nimble touch and his ability to perform with electrifying abandon one moment and goosebump-inducing sensitivity and restraint the next.<\/p>\n
![\"Blues](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/SUT-L-MUSIC-BUDDYGUYREVIEW-01_a92a9e.jpeg\")
Blues great Buddy Guy\u2019s last song at his Friday concert at The Shell found him playing his longest guitar solo of the night as he walked through the enthusiastic audience.(Chad Kelco \/ Courtesy San Diego Symphony)<\/p>\n
At his best Friday, Guy\u2019s guitar work was terrific. His whisper-soft solo on the B.B. King staple \u201cHow Blue Can You Get?\u201d was a gem of finesse and soulful nuance. And there were moments during his rendition of the Denise LaSalle-penned ZZ Hill hit, \u201cSomeone Else Is Steppin\u2019 In,\u201d where his playing cut through the balmy night air with surgical accuracy.<\/p>\n
But, too often, Guy sounded sloppy and erratic, seesawing in and out of tune as he played enough clams \u2014 musician\u2019s parlance for bum notes \u2014 to almost stock a seafood diner. In multiple instances, he bent his strings out of tune with alarming frequency. It was a sharp contrast from his heyday, when Guy bent his strings any and every which way while staying consistently in tune.<\/p>\n
Of course, it is not realistic to expect any 90-year-old musician to match the lofty standards and fervor that they did in their prime. And Guy has accomplished so much in a 69-year career that any time he performs now provides an opportunity to celebrate the legacy of this hugely influential guitarist and singer.<\/p>\n
But Friday\u2019s concert also provided the opportunity to contemplate the pros and cons of retiring and unretiring, of acknowledging the passing of time and then trying one\u2019s best to defy it.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m old,\u201d said Guy, who nevertheless remained on his feet for his entire 71-minute performance. That he spent nearly as much time talking between his songs (and, sometimes, during them) as he did performing them may be a reflection of age. Ditto his propensity for profanity \u2014 he twice implored the audience to \u201cGet your minds out of the (expletive) gutter.\u201d He unleashed even more f-bombs Friday than at his 2023 Shell concert, sometimes with a twinkle in his eye, sometimes not.<\/p>\n
Listening to Guy reflect between songs on his life provided a real-time portal to a largely bygone era. He referenced 78 RPM records, laboring on a Louisiana cotton plantation in his youth, and the dearth of the rural juke joints he cut his teeth playing music in for almost entirely Black audiences \u2014 much like the one in the Oscar-winning film \u201cSinners,\u201d in which Guy pays a short but key role.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey got only three 90-year-old blues players still alive,\u201d he told the audience. \u201cWillie Nelson, Bobby Rush and you\u2019re looking at the third.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"Buddy](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/SUT-L-MUSIC-BUDDYGUYREVIEW-01_0fe487.jpeg\")
Buddy Guy\u2019s devotion to the blues was unmistakable during his Friday night San Diego concert. (Chad Kelco \/ Courtesy San Diego Symphony)<\/p>\n
Nelson is 93 and Rush is 92, but the point was well-taken. The end of an era is nearing for Guy and his still-active nonagenarian peers. All three are clearly eager to continue doing what they love, even if doing so \u2014 at least in Guy\u2019s case \u2014 yields increasingly bumpy returns.<\/p>\n
What prompted him to announce his farewell tour several years ago?<\/p>\n
\u201cI watched all the old guys like B.B. King, Howlin\u2019 Wolf and Muddy Waters go until they got old,\u201d Guy told Guitar Player magazine three years ago this month. \u201cOften, when you watch older people playing shows, you think, \u2018Man\u2026 they just don\u2019t sound the way they did when they were younger.\u2019 I remember listening to some of my heroes when they got older and thinking it wasn\u2019t the same.\u201d<\/p>\n
What prompted Guy to unretire, beyond a likely craving to get back in front of audiences eager to connect with a musical pioneer while they still can?<\/p>\n
\u201cI thought about all those great blues players who are no longer with us \u2014 B.B. King. Lightnin\u2019 Hopkins, all those guys,\u201d Guy told Guitar Player last year.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd they used to tell me: \u2018You need to keep playing and keep representing the blues,\u2019 \u2019cause they don\u2019t play it on radio or anything anymore. So I said to myself: \u2018Well, Buddy, you better hang on a little longer. My health ain\u2019t doing too bad, so I\u2019m still doing what I\u2019ve always done \u2026 every time I get on stage, just try to play the best I can.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Buddy Guy is surely not the first blues legend and Rock & Roll Hall of Fame inductee to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":462072,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[182111,182110,47816,27672,74,76,75],"class_list":["post-462071","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-diego","tag-blues-legend","tag-buddy-guy","tag-kennedy-center","tag-rock-roll-hall-of-fame","tag-san-diego","tag-san-diego-headlines","tag-san-diego-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/462071","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=462071"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/462071\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/462072"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=462071"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=462071"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=462071"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}