Biography
A native of Ohio, Scott Kirby began his study of music at the age of six, and continued formal piano instruction for seventeen years. He worked under Robert Howat of Wittenberg University of Ohio, and Sylvia Zaremba at the Ohio State University. After obtaining an English degree from Ohio State University, Kirby moved to New Orleans and began his professional music career, as a street performer. In the following four years, he recorded the complete rags of Scott Joplin, and made his debut at all of the major ragtime festivals in the United States, as well as festivals in Belgium, France, Norway, New Zealand, and Hungary.
Kirby has served as Musical Director of the Scott Joplin Ragtime Festival in Sedalia, MO, and of the Rocky Mountain Ragtime and American Music Festival in Boulder, CO, as well as director of the San Juan Islands Ragtime Institute. His appearances include a segment on CBS News Sunday Morning with Charles Osgood in 1998, and at the Smithsonian Institute in Washington D.C. Kirby co-founded a record company (Viridiana Productions, L.L.C.), has made 25 recordings, and has composed over 150 original works for piano and other instruments. Admired by fellow pianists including George Winston, and hailed by Time Magazine as an “ace pianist,” CBS News’ Charles Osgood agreed that “…Critics call Scott Kirby one of the best interpreters of ragtime music on the scene today.”
Kirby’s artistic passion grew to include to visual art, and in 2005, while living in France, he completed 75 paintings and 28 piano compositions, including “The Prairie Devotionals,” The paintings (belonging to a set entitled “Visions of the Great Plains”) and the new musical works set the groundwork for his new multi-media project “Main Street Souvenirs.” Kirby now lives in Boulder, Colorado and divides his time between composing, painting, performing and teaching.
Press Kits
Click below to download a ZIP file of the Press Kit for each of Scott's available programs.
Accolades
"Kirby is leading the way toward an irresistible keyboard literature that has its roots in the past... and its eye on the present."
- Max Morath
"Scott Kirby is one of the best interpreters of traditional ragtime piano."
- Tom Piazza, The Oxford American, 1999
"Scott Kirby is at the forefront of the Terra Verde movement... an emerging style that adds a fresh view to piano traditions of eras gone by."
- Piano Today, 1988
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