Best blues guitarist, Clapton or Green

Piezo,
I saw B.B. King last summer at the Molson Centre here in Montreal. He has to do his show sitting down now, but, believe me, there is still magic there. A so called music critic in "La Presse", a French daily here, harpooned him. He had no idea who B.B. King is, and what the blues are, kept referring to him as "pappy" (French from the other side of the pond for "grandpa") and was amazed that the crowd was ecstatic. That tells you something about what a person needs to know to be a music critic, at least in Québec. I couldn't find time to write a "shocked and appalled" letter to the editor, I guess that's why I'm going on about this now. How could I forget Gatemouth Brown. I saw him in a local club two or three winters ago. Still an amazing musician at his age. There are so many blues guitarists out there, it's sort of like writing in a way, just about everyone can write, very few are Hemingway or Steinbeck though. In my mind, it takes more than dexterity (read blinding speed) and tone to be a blues guitarist, it takes a whole lot of soul. Regards.

Pbb, I fully, wholeheartedly, subscribe to your last sentence.
Great blues guitarists manage to communicate playing even a single note on the guitar...

You saw G. Brown live -- lucky devil!

Playing blues is very easy, making it sound "real" is very difficult. It's about touch and feel. Peter Green sweats these qualities and caresses every note with them. This is why he is so well respected by other guitarist. It's not flashy, but it's shot full of soul.

Not to sound flippant, but you can't swing a dead cat without hitting a great player and they should all be appreciated for their individual talent.

BTW, back in 1977-78 I lived across the street from Duke Robbilard in Providence. He was fronting Roomful Of Blues and he was heavily into T-Bone. It's was so cool to listen to this talented person practice. Even his mistakes sounded good.

Never got to see Stevie in concert, but for my money he is the blues guitar king. If you ever saw the Austin City Limits featuring SRV you would be picking your jaw up off the ground. He was truly one with his instrument.

I have had the privelege of seeing and hearing Peter Green and Eric Clapton many times. I saw Green with the first Fleetwood Mac tour in the 60s. Clapton several times with each of his incarnations starting with Cream (5X). Green has been my favorite white blues guitarist since the first time I heard him but I cannot disagree with the other contributors that the great black guitarists played from another dimension. No race owns the blues but playing them and feeling them are obviously not the same thing and invariably, in my experience,white musicians have more often played them. Robert Johnson would be my top nomination for sheer creativity and interpretation.