Artists:Kevin So

In a decade of performing his original music around the country, Kevin So has earned the respect of his fellow musicians (Keb' Mo' and Amos Lee, for starters), won over members of the press and radio (the Boston Globe, WFUV, many more) and built up a substantial fan base coast to coast. With the sky still the limit, he has spent more than 15 years giving free rein to his musical imagination.

Born and raised in Boston as the son of first-generation Chinese-Americans, So channeled his early passion for singing and playing piano and guitar into the start of a career in music with his appearance, in 1990, on a nationally broadcast Fox television show hosted by Natalie Cole called "Big Break." (This urban-flavored "Star Search" served as a model for “American Idol.") Three years later, after graduating from the University of Southern California with a degree in Jazz Studies, he had a colorful life experience playing keyboards with a cruise ship show band that accompanied Elvis Presley, Madonna, Tina Turner, and Buddy Holly impersonators, not to mention jugglers and magicians too.

In 1994, So toured the country as a member of a pop/rock/r&b cover band that later had some of its musicians moving on to Britney Spears’ band. When not playing keyboards with the group, he spent a considerable amount of time listening to the recorded music of Bob Dylan early in his career and to the Delta blues of Robert Johnson. Investigations, too, of folk troubadour Woody Guthrie and country music founding father Hank Williams gave him further grounding in the fundamentals of great American acoustic music.

Read more..