Buddy Guy is still strumming the blues with his buddies

Buddy Guy called, as promised, at 8:45 a.m.

That is not a time when you'd expect a blues legend -- even one who's a cell-phone buddy of Eric Clapton -- to be conducting business.

"It's not early for me. I've been up since about 3:30 this morning," said Guy. "Ever since I left Louisiana 53 years ago, I tried to change, but I can't. I do go back [to sleep] every day at about 1 or 2 o'clock and pick up that little extra two or three hours. I just love to get up in the morning ever since I was on the farm and the roosters would wake me up. I tell people that if you get up at 4 o'clock in the morning, you can get a breath of fresh air before all the cars crank up."

Guy, 73, is busy, touring with B.B. King (they're at the Orpheum on Saturday) and moving his landmark Chicago nightclub, Buddy Guy's Legends, because the building's owner, Columbia College, needs to expand.

"They could have closed me up three or four years ago, but they gave me a chance to relocate," Guy explained. "I finally got lucky enough to buy a building in the same block."

So, after nearly 21 years at 754 Wabash, he will move to 700 Wabash, probably near the end of the month. "It's much bigger," he said. "We're not going to close. We're just gonna walk the tables and bars and booths down the street and quick plug in the guitar."

B.B. as teacher

"It's like when you go to grade school and listen to your teacher," Guy said last week from Nashville. "That's the way I feel when I'm around him. You get your education. I tell him, 'When you play, I should just sit and listen.'"

Similarly, many rock guitarists have gone to school on Guy -- from Clapton and Jimi Hendrix to Jonny Lang and John Mayer. Guy is modest about that.

"If you think about it, we all got something from somebody," he said. "What goes around comes around. I met some people, like the late Fred McDowell and Son House, who Muddy Waters copied after. They said, 'Son, we learned how to play from listening to somebody, too.' I had those 78 [rpm] records with John Lee Hooker, Lightnin' Hopkins and Muddy Waters and I had to figure out myself what they were doing. Nowadays, you can get an instructional tape or you can watch television or you can be taught that. I didn't have nobody to teach me."

Knowing he couldn't match the skills of his heroes, Guy decided early on to toss in some showmanship, which he says he got from Guitar Slim. He realized how effective theatricality could be when he participated in a battle of guitars -- top prize was a half-pint of whisky -- on a snowy night shortly after he'd moved to Chicago.

"I walked in the door playing guitar and they gave me the whisky and I didn't even drink at the time," Guy recalled. "I was learning, and I just wanted to get some attention."

He's certainly received plenty of attention in his long career, first as a session guitarist for Chess Records, then teaming with harmonica player Junior Wells and playing with Led Zeppelin, Clapton and Stephen Stills at the Supershow in England in 1969.

Since signing with Silvertone Records in 1991, he has experienced a resurgence. He has won five Grammys and was inducted in 2005 to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. His top accolade may be an unofficial one -- "the best global ambassador of Chicago blues the city has ever had," the Chicago Sun-Times dubbed him in January.

"I'm trying to get the city to get a blues museum now," Guy said. "I'm just trying to pay back. So I'm just holding onto the club. Hopefully, you'll be interviewing some of the kids one day and they'll be saying 'If it wasn't for Buddy Guy's Legends, I wouldn't be here tonight.'"

Guy has a couple of high-profile events set for Chicago on the weekend of June 25. Carlos Santana has offered to officially christen the new Legends club. On June 26, Guy will participate in Clapton's Crossroads Guitar Festival with more than 20 guitar stars, including Jeff Beck, Robert Randolph, Vince Gill, Bert Jansch, Santana, Mayer and King.

Meanwhile, Guy can be seen with Clapton in a new TV commercial for a T-Mobile phone.

Maybe he could have an early-morning DVD double-feature.