The son of a bricklayer, British rock artist Eric Clapton attended Kingston Art School before choosing the quicksilver life of a street musician. Clapton's guitar prowess did not go unrecognized for long, and soon he was aligned with the Yardbirds, a major Mersey-beat band of the 1960s. Clapton owns the distinction of appearing with three of the most popular rock aggregations in music history: The Yardbirds, Cream and Blind Faith. So devoted were Clapton's followers that, by 1970, graffiti began popping up all over the world proclaiming "Clapton Is God." Even into the 1990s, Clapton has earned several Grammy awards for his ongoing musical contributions. Most of Clapton's film appearances have been in concert or "retrospective" movies like Concert for Bangladesh (71), The Last Waltz (78) and Chuck Berry Hail! Hail! Rock N Roll (87).
His signature solo hit "Layla" was used memorably by Martin Scorsese in this 1990 gangster masterpiece Goodfellas, and he scored a huge hit with "Tears In Heaven" which featured prominently in the 1991 film Rush. In addition to a number of concert films and music documentaries, Clapton provided some of the most intimate remembrances of George Harrison in the Scorsese directed biography George Harrison: Living in the Material World.