LYNN ? Tickets are on sale now for a star-studded tribute to the legendary James Cotton.”Boston Legends: A Tribute to James Cotton” will rock City Hall Veterans Memorial Auditorium on May 21 at 8 p.m.Cotton, who will be at the event, was born in 1935 in Tunica, Miss.As the youngest child in a large family, he grew up in cotton fields where he worked alongside his parents. His father Mose was a Baptist preacher.Cotton says some of his earliest memories are of his mother playing chicken and train sounds on her harmonica and for a few years he thought those were the only sounds the harmonica could make. That idea evaporated quickly when Cotton received a 15 cent harmonica for Christmas one year. Cotton said when he heard the harmonica legend Sonny Boy Williamson (Rice Miller) playing on the radio, his love affair with the harmonica started.At age 9, Cotton lost both his parents and an uncle introduced him to Williamson.Cotton said he immediately started playing Williamson’s radio show theme song.”I walked up and played it for him,” he said. “And I played it note for note. And he looked at that. He had to pay attention.”The two were inseparable for years following that encounter and Cotton, who was too young to go into the juke joints where Williamson performed, would stay outside and play for tips. In 1954, Cotton got a break when Muddy Waters hired him to play harp in his band. You would be hard pressed to find a blues performer Cotton has not played with over the years. This year marks Cotton’s 66th year in the entertainment business and the show at Lynn City Hall is a fitting tribute to the Grammy Award winner, who has been inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame and the Smithsonian Institution.Performers include Billy Hull, Michael Carabello of Santana, former Boston member Sib Hashian, David Hull, Jon Butcher, Magic Dick of the J. Geils Band with the James Montgomery Band, Billy Squire and The Uptown Horns.If You Go?Tickets are $30-$45 and are available online at www.ticketfusion.com, by calling 781-581-2971 and at the box office in City Hall.