It’s hard to imagine a UK equivalent of this. It’s a 1977 episode of Sanford And Son, the US sitcom loosely based on Steptoe And Son. From about 7:20 there’s a sensational performance at Club Lucifer by the legendary BB King - who died this week - of one of his greatest songs, How Blue Can You Get? And at the end there’s a quick burst of St Louis Blues, with cast members swapping verses with King.
But that’s not all - the whole episode’s about BB King, and his surprising connection with the Sanfords. It has a punchline not unlike the Leo Kottke song Pamela Brown, where it turns out BB - it stands for “Beer Belly” according to Fred Sanford - is glad the woman he loved as a young man left him, because otherwise he’d never have had a career instead with his beloved Lucille. Lucille is famously King’s precious guitar, that he supposedly once rescued from a burning building, but the truth is he had loads of them over the years and they were all called Lucille
King always has a sneaky smile on his face, in the clips I’ve seen: the blues is a joyous music, whatever the subject matter. But I’ve never seen anything like the acting he does in this version of How Blue Can You Get? Maybe his finest hour of all. RIP.
