Because a persistent sore throat had him saving his voice, in an interview preceding his May '87 show at LaPorte's Civic Auditorium, Vaughan wrote out his answers to questions in longhand because he didn't want to disappoint a journalist by cancelling his promised interview.
Vaughan mentioned something that Johnny Winter once told him about Muddy Waters saying he respected the people who came after him and played the blues, because it made people repect him and his fellow blues pioneers all the more. He added, "We're not taking credit for this music, we're trying to give it back."
Michiana's own renowned blues guitarist, Southside Denny, met Stevie Ray Vaughan twice. First, when Duke Tumatoe's band which included Denny at the time, opened for Vaughan in 1984 in Rockford, Ill.
Denny recalled that meeting this week, saying "I remember how he always gave credit to other people. I'd compliment him on different things and he'd say, 'Oh I got that from Lightning Hopkins, or that's a Buddy Guy thing and Lonnie Mack was the first one to play that.'"
Denny met Vaughan again backstage when he played at the Morris Civic Auditorium in September of '85.
"He was always out touring," he said. "He loved to play and he loved the music. Stevie Ray Vaughan gave something back, and that's what the blues is all about."
Local Blue Light Special guitarist Tim Erickson said he was moved to start playing guitar again after 10 years away from the instrument, when he first heard Vaughan's "Texas Flood" in '83.
"He and Clapton were the only ones who ever really 'got' me," he said. "I'd never heard guitar played like that before!"
"After I heard him, I went out and started buying all the blues albums I could find, learning things from Southside Denny and trying to figure it all out. He was always one of the guys I listened to a lot."
Harvey Stauffer, host of the weekly Blues Review on WVPE-FM 88, reflected on Vaughan's role in bringing increased attention to blues.
"He really helped the blues by showing respect to the early blues guitarists who came along before him," he said. "He knew his roots."
Staufffer recalled an interview he heard with Vaughan in which he remarked that he always tried to give 110 percent concert, "...because you never know, it just might the last time I get to play the blues."
Stauffer confirmed that the Saturday (9/1) edition of the Blues Review, beginning at 2 p.m. would focus on Vaughan's legacy to the blues.
"We'll be playing a lot of his music during the first hour of the show, and we'll take requests for it during the second hour."
Dan Morissette, co-owner of Nightwinds Records in Niles, was at the Alpine Valley concert Sunday before the accident. He remarked on the energy level of the concert, saying "...it was an unbelieveable show."
"Cray, Clapton, Stevie Ray Vaughan, they all seemed fired up- like they had something to prove. When his older brother (guitarist Jimmie Vaughan) joining him on stage, they hugged each other- it was a real emotional thing."
Morissette recalled that he and his wife saw the lights of the helicopters landing as they were leaving the show and didn't recall the fog as being particularly thick.
"We could see stars through it," he said. "We spent the night there, at the Alpine Valley Resort and the next morning about 7 a.m. there was a news flash on the TV about a helicopter crash."
"I went downstairs and asked the people at the restaurant and they didn't know anything about it. Then we saw the hearses come driving up between 8:30 and 9 p.m. We knew that it wasn't Clapton, but we didn't actually hear that it was Stevie Ray Vaughan until we were on our way home that morning."
Morissette speculated on the recording Vaughan might have done, citing "Riviera Paradise" the last track on Vaughan's '89 "In Step" album, which he said Vaughan performed at his final Alpine Valley show.
"He seemed to me to be moving in the direction of jazz," he added, "It makes me especially sad because I wanted to see what his new music would sound like."