Kenny White - Gifted and Witty Piano Man

Kenny White, wearing a fedora and glasses, opened for Cheryl Wheeler with his song, “Out of My Element”. He plays the piano with a flourish like Elton John and turns an elegant phrase like Randy Newman;

“I’m trying to walk straight but the sidewalk is nervous,

 my tears need a curfew, my steps need a purpose”

He said they had been touring in Colorado and it was nice to be at sea level again. I could tell he was funny but then he played, “Five Girls”. Here’s a bit of that song, but I left out the best part. You have to go see him and hear him live to hear the rest of it. 

“I said, Hey
If Edison had said no
If Jonas Salk had said no
If Debussy had said no
If Jesus Christ had said no
If Willie Mays had said no
If Shakespeare had said no
If Sigmund Freud had said no
I’ll tell you where we’d be
We’d be sick and in the darkness
With no one to inspire us
And nothing on TV
And even less in the fridge
We’d be blaming dad for everything
And not even have our Sundays off to barbeque
But you can’t be crucified
for the things you don’t do”

He talked about his parents marrying over a weekend furlough during World War II, being separated for two years and then spending the next 58 years literally, happily together.

The funniest and perhaps most heartbreaking song was, “Gotta Sing High”, about the wasteland of popular music and the public’s vapid taste in it;

“You gotta sing high, then even higher
gotta look sensitive, mess up your hair
but not like you meant to, sing things like ‘you’re beautiful’
and then repeat the line. And then repeat the line.
Repeat the line.”

Kenny said that he works a lot with Judy Collins and records on her Wildflowers label. His strengths are great insight and humor, a gift for rhyme plus he’s a skillful and energetic pianist and guitarist. He played and sang backup with Cheryl Wheeler during her set.

Check out his website, “which he paid a lot of money for” at

http://kennywhite.net

(Please, not Kenny Loggins, Kenny Rogers, Kenny G. or the realtor at kennywhite.com).