Memphis, Tennessee, where guitar legend B.B. King started his career, will mourn the late King of the Blues with a procession next week before his burial in his native Mississippi. The city announced a concert next Wednesday followed by a procession down Beale Street — the downtown strip famous for its blues clubs — where B.B. King derived his stage-name. ‘B.B. King and Memphis had a long-time love affair, so it’s only fitting that the city mark his life on Beale Street,’ Mayor A.C. Wharton said in a statement. King’s hearse will then travel some 250 kilometers (150 miles) south to the Mississippi Delta, where he grew up, and will be buried on May 30 near the museum bearing his name in the town of Indianola. Born in poverty and working cotton fields, Riley B. King mastered the guitar and entered the business after traveling to Memphis and working for radio stations.
