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Dan Dunlap of Blacksburg is portrayed on the cover of Clapton's 1980 album, "Just One Night."

Charlie Hamill of Roanoke is portrayed on the cover of Clapton's 1983 album, "Money and Cigarettes."

Kenny Seay of Buchanan is portrayed on the cover of Clapton's 1978 album, "Backless."

Photo illustrations by Seth Gitner and Grant Jedlinsky

Video

• Watch video of these musicians talking about Clapton, his music and influence.
• See more video of these players, including Dan Dunlap's version of Robert Johnson's "Crossroads Blues," a song that was a major influence on Clapton.

Music is all about influences. Nothing great is made in isolation.

Eric Clapton, whose book, "Clapton: The Autobiography" (inset), remains among The New York Times' top 25 best-sellers since its October release, reminds us of this.

He writes that Robert Johnson, Muddy Waters, B.B. King, Elmore James and others inspired him.

Clapton laboriously learned the blues language from those players and others, and turned on Britain, then the world, to a style of music that was obscure to younger music lovers of the 1960s.

While the Rolling Stones, and to some extent, the Beatles, had already been doing the same thing with blues song structures, Clapton was playing lead lines that were among the best in the rock world at the time. About 1965, graffiti shouting that "Clapton is God" was springing up all over London. Clapton writes that he was mystified and a little scared of that kind of recognition, but that part of him welcomed it.

"The fact is, of course, that through my playing, people were being exposed to a kind of music that was new to them, and I was getting all the credit for it, as if I had invented the blues," he writes.

We sat down with three guitar players from the Roanoke and New River valleys, all of whom were influenced by Clapton. We got their thoughts on Clapton's impact on their playing -- and we got to hear a few tasty licks.

Elvis Costello once said that if he really wanted to know an artist, he wouldn't read a book -- he would instead check out the art.

Turns out, only one of our three players here -- Charlie Hamill -- has read Clapton's autobiography. But it's clear that all three of them have checked out the art.

DAN DUNLAP

Age: 45

Home: Blacksburg

Bands: Three Minute Lovin', The Kind, formerly with Electric Woodshed

Business: Owner, Rocket Music in Blacksburg, where he teaches some guitar

Dunlap's first band was called After Midnight, named for the J.J. Cale song that Clapton popularized in 1970. Plenty of Clapton's songs were on that band's playlist, and in Dunlap's years of playing, he reckons he's played about 50 Clapton songs.

Dunlap's first significant exposure to Clapton was when Clapton played with the band Cream, which also featured bassist Jack Bruce and drummer Ginger Baker. That was where Clapton unveiled his first Robert Johnson cover, "Crossroads Blues."

Dunlap later met and befriended Bob Margolin, a Durham, N.C.-based guitarist who had played for years with Muddy Waters. Clapton played often with Waters, whom he considered a father figure.

Through Margolin, Dunlap heard about Clapton's intense work to understand the feel and licks that characterized Robert Johnson's sound.

"Bob Margolin ... actually showed up at his house one day, and he was heavily into Robert Johnson, playing a song over and over again, trying to figure it out," Dunlap said. " 'Listen, he made a mistake!' " Clapton told Margolin. " 'A mistake. Listen!' "

That close attention to detail helped Clapton emulate such artists as B.B. King, with whom he made the album "Riding with the King."

Clapton's ironic nickname "Slowhand" notwithstanding, it wasn't so much speed as note selection and pitch bending that made Clapton what he is.

Dunlap pointed at a wall in his lesson room, to a poster with a quote from B.B. King: " 'Sometimes it's the notes that you don't play,' " Dunlap said, reading from the poster. "And Clapton had that ability to give you just that one note that goes deep, instead of a bunch that go shallow."

CHARLIE HAMILL

Age: 38

Home: Roanoke

Bands: ROCKS and Sugar Love

Business: Director, Downtown Music Lab, Roanoke

Hamill's Clapton story is pretty similar to Seay's. He grew up hearing and relating to Eric Clapton. But when he took up guitar, Van Halen was his man, and he tried to get those licks under his fingers. Later, he learned what Seay learned -- that Clapton had been Van Halen's biggest influence.

But in conversation, the first thing Hamill brought up was Clapton's Crossroads Centre in Antigua, a rehabilitation facility for alcoholics and drug addicts.

For years, Clapton was notorious, first as a heroin addict, then as an alcoholic. In fact, his is one of the few survival stories from an era of great musicianship, songwriting and performance that was marred by the drug-related deaths of such icons as Janis Joplin and Jimi Hendrix. (Clapton writes that Hendrix's death hit him particularly hard. He writes that he's probably alive today because he was afraid of needles, so he snorted heroin instead of shooting up.)

The recovering addict saw familiar problems while spending time at a home he owns in Antigua, in the Caribbean West Indies. By 1998, the Crossroads Centre was a reality. Since then, many musicians have gone there, while the center continues to provide funding for Antiguans battling addictions.

"I've just seen some good it's done for my musician friends from around the world," Hamill said. "They have people down there who understand what it means to be in this business ... and cope with what comes with it."

KENNY SEAY

Age: 39

Home: Buchanan

Bands: Burning Bridges, various side projects

Business: Seay's School of Music, Buchanan

Seay is a technical player, and early on in his playing, he said he couldn't understand the fuss about Clapton.

"I was thinking, 'Oh my God, this guy's not so great,' " Seay said. "It was not impressing me that much."

But one of Seay's earliest influences, Eddie Van Halen, was a Clapton acolyte.

"When your heroes say, 'Listen to Clapton,' then you go back and listen," he said. "Now I get where he's coming from. If you really want to learn where to get your blues and scale stuff down, you've got to go to Clapton."

Like Dunlap, Seay points to small things Clapton has done, such as a lick in the 1985 song, "Forever Man."

"This one lick, every time I'd hear it, I'd go, 'That was awesome,' " he said. "He's bending and striking the string in an individual way.

"I stole it. That lick is mine now. But it was Clapton."

Seay teaches guitar, and he complains of hearing younger players focusing on guitar parts that aren't as musical, that don't have real staying power.

"I wish some of these kids would go back to this stuff."