Fans pay last respects to B.B. King in Las Vegas

The music world suffered a tremendous loss when pioneering blues guitarist B.B. King died at his Las Vegas home a little more than a week ago at the age of 89. Fans of King were given an opportunity to pay tribute to him on Friday afternoon at a public viewing organized by the musician’s family.

Fans began arriving early at Palm South Jones Mortuary, 1600 S. Jones Blvd., on Friday afternoon to bid farewell to the beloved bluesman.

By 2:30 p.m., the queue grew to more than a hundred fans and stretched down the sidewalk from the chapel entrance to Jones Boulevard, where it wrapped its way up to the north entrance.

As people waited to be led into the chapel for a chance to pay their last respects to the revered musician in person, the legendary blues guitarist’s distinctive riffs rang out, pouring from the speakers of phones held up by a handful of fans, many of whom were clad in T-shirts emblazoned with King’s iconic image.

King’s daughter, Rita Washington, arrived just before fans were led inside and made her way through the crowd, stopping to thank everybody individually for coming out to celebrate her dad, handing out envelope-sized postcards with family photos of B.B.

While local residents like Phil Priscu, who shared a heartwarming anecdote with Rita about meeting her father, were on hand for the viewing, there were also fans who made their way here from other parts of the country such as Wichita, Kan.; Memphis, Tenn.; and Indiana.

Georgia Jackson, a lifelong fan of King who came to town just for the viewing, boarded a flight from San Francisco Friday morning.

Although she had no plans for an overnight stay, as she was due back at work on this afternoon, she wasn’t about to miss a chance to say goodbye to the man who provided the soundtrack to her childhood.

“Growing up in the housing projects, at 4 or 5 years old, my mom used to play B.B. King songs,” she recalled. “I could always tell when she broke up with one of her boyfriends. She would play them at two or three o’clock in the morning: ‘Baby, you done lost your good thing now / The way I used to love you, that’s the way I hate you now.’

“She’d be drinking her beer and everything, ‘the thrill is gone,’ yelling outside, one or two o’clock in the morning, in the housing projects, and she would wake me up. ‘Get your ass up. Get on up out of your bed and come and sing some blues for me.’ I’d go to school, like 6 years old, just dragging, and my teacher, I remember, Mr. Pedullah would say, ‘Are you OK? Is everything OK at the house?’ I’d say, ‘Everything’s fine.’

“I have memories,” she went on, smiling at the recollection. “You know, it’s life. I grew up with him. I lived that life. ‘The Thrill is Gone,’ ‘Why I Sing the Blues,’ all those songs — I lived that life.”

A private funeral for King is planned for today in Las Vegas before the guitarist is laid to rest next week in Mississippi.

Read more from Dave Herrera at bestoflasvegas.com. Contact him at dherrera@reviewjournal.com.