Troye Kinnett

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  Muncie, Indiana, native Troye Kinnett spent much of his youth listening to such musical talents as Stevie Wonder and Elton John.  He began playing the piano at the young age of eight.  By the time he was in high school, Troye was incorporating the guitar riffs and solos of Eddie Van Halen into his keyboard playing, developing a two-handed percussive style of soloing.  Troye attended Ball State where he studied music composition and played in the University’s top jazz ensemble.  While in college, he immersed himself in a variety of musical styles, including classical, jazz, rock, country and gospel.  Although Troye was developing a diverse musical background, he'd return to his Midwestern roots later.

Early in his career, Troye toured with several rock bands playing in clubs across Indiana and in several other states.  He increasingly began to work as a studio keyboardist where his talent soon gained him much deserved recognition.  Eventually, he began working in Indianapolis as both a composer and as an audio engineer.  He had the opportunity to write music for a variety of entities, including the NCAA, the Heartland Film Festival, Eli Lilly, F.C. Tucker, Simon Malls, Subway, and H.H. Gregg.  His compositions have won Addy, Telly, and Silver Microphone awards, and he has scored independent feature films that have aired on Showtime and The Movie Channel.
Throughout this period, Troye performed on studio recordings for other artists while remaining active on the live music scene.  He performed and recorded with Donovan, The Boxtops, Rare Earth, Eddie Money, Jonny Lang, Larry Crane, Ray Boltz, Jimmy Ryser, Carl Storie, Jennie DeVoe, Dane Clark, and Grammy Award winner, Sandi Patty.

In the fall of 2005, Troye was asked to record with fellow Hoosier and perhaps the most well-known celebrity from Indiana, John Mellencamp.  Six months later, Troye began touring with Mellencamp’s band, playing keyboards and singing background vocals.  He was a member of the band during the recording of Mellencamp’s highest Billboard debuting album, Freedom’s Road, which featured guest artists Little Big Town and Joan Baez.  More recently, Troye played an important role on the newest Mellencamp CD, Life Death Love and Freedom, produced by T-Bone Burnett, which has been called Mellencamp’s best album in 21 years by some critics, and was one of Rolling Stone’s top five albums of 2008.  Troye played a variety of instruments on that CD, including the Hammond B3, field organ, melodica, piano, accordion, as well as percussion.  “The new album has a very distinct sound, due in part to Troye’s keyboard parts.”  (Ernie Rideout, Editor in Chief, Keyboard Magazine.)  The haunting song "Troubled Land" from this album, featuring Troye's signature organ riff, also appears on NCIS: The Official TV Soundtrack on CBS Records.  His musical talent and keyboard and accordion skills, together with his Indiana roots, make him a perfect fit for the band headed by Mellencamp, a newly inducted member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

Troye Kinnett has gained a wealth of knowledge and experience in the music industry ranging from audio engineering, playing Broadway musicals, recording album projects, performing live, and scoring for television, radio, and film.  This has lead to notable performances on The Today Show, The Late Show with David Letterman, Jimmy Kimmel Live, The Bob and Tom Show, the NCAA Final Four concert, Farm Aid, the NFL’s “Countdown to Kickoff” on NBC, a live video recording at Capitol Records EMI Studios, and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony.  He has performed in the U.S., Canada, Europe, Australia, and New Zealand, and he has appeared on stage with Billy Joel, John Fogerty, Sheryl Crow, Joan Jett, Paul Schaffer, Susan Tedeschi, and Derek Trucks.  Troye continues to record and tour with Mellencamp’s band; when not doing so, he composes radio and television commercials at Earshot Audio-Post and serves as the music director for The Garden.  The October 2008 issue of Keyboard Magazine appropriately identifies Troye as “a consummate professional.”  He is an award-winning composer, experienced audio engineer, vocalist, rocker at heart, and exceptional keyboardist who is comfortable in most any musical situation.

http://www.troyekinnett.com/bio.htm
By TLBecsey

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Musician hits road with Mellencamp

By MICHELLE KINSEY
[email protected]

When Indiana rocker John Mellencamp needed a keyboard player for the spring leg of his "Words and Music" tour, he didn't have to look far.

He snagged Muncie's own Troye Kinnett for the gig, which had him on the road for nearly four weeks, playing in front of thousands.

"It was just incredible," Kinnett said recently. "I didn't want it to end. We were really getting into the groove ... and it was over."

Kinnett, 39, said he felt really comfortable with Mellencamp & Co. on stage. The highlight each night was playing the familiar accordion part on Check It Out.

The mini-tour of mostly Indiana dates included the "tornado show" in downtown Indianapolis during the NCAA Final Four.

"It started raining with about three songs left," Kinnett said of the outdoor show on Monument Circle that drew an estimated 80,000 fans. "It didn't seem that bad at the time, but a half an hour later, we were riding it out on the tour bus, and we really thought the bus was going to tip over."

Kinnett has worked with most of the guys in the band before, but this was his first time on stage with Mellencamp.

"His vocal range was a lot higher than I ever noticed before; his pitch was great," he said. "That's hard to do when you are putting on an energetic show like he does. He's always moving."

Mellencamp expected the rest of his band to do the same.

"He really kept us on our toes," Kinnett said with a laugh. "That first night on the tour, he came over to me before Hurt So Good and said, 'You are singing it.' He pointed to his mic and I went up and sang the first verse and chorus. It was a lot of fun, and it ended up staying in the show."

Mellencamp, he added, was all about spontaneity.

"Reviews of the show often said Mellencamp had a rapport with the band," Kinnett said. "That's true. It was a lot of fun for everybody, and everybody in the audience could tell."

Kinnett's day job is recording and writing jingles and the like at his Indy company, Earshot Audio. He is the man behind Ball State University's Everything You Needmusic. He also composed the music for the HH Gregg commercials.

On the day we spoke with him, he was writing music for Simon Malls.

As a studio musician, he works often with artists at Gaither Studios in Alexandria.

Kinnett started taking piano lessons on the south side of Muncie when he was 8 years old. "It was the one thing I could do better than my big brother," Kinnett joked. As a kid, he idolized Stevie Wonder, then Eddie Van Halen.

In high school, he started forming bands. He's hooked up with several groups over the years, most notably Ten-O-One and the Jimmy Ryser band.

Today, in addition to studio work, he'll do the occasional wedding or play piano at a country club. Not being in a touring band all the time keeps him at home more with his family -- wife Barb and a 6-year-old son (who is already showing a love for the drums).

"It takes a lot of juggling to make a career out of music," he said. "But it's worth it when you love what you do."

Besides, he still has some goals to check of his list.

"I want my own national album," he said. "And I want to play on the Late Show with Paul Shaffer."

http://www.thestarpress.com/apps/pbcs.dl...=73245421656396

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http://www.keyboardmag.com/article/grassroots-rock/oct-08/88015

Grassroots Rock

Road Warrior: Troye Kinnett with John Mellencamp

by Ernie Rideout
photos by Ernie Rideout/VSH, unless otherwise noted

For more info on Troye, please visit: www.troyekinnett.com

John Mellencamp has crafted a very effective image as the guy next door, the man just doing his best, the songwriter who speaks for the heartland. His success speaks for itself, as he’s penned some of the most anthemic hits of the past 25 years, among them “R.O.C.K. in the U.S.A,” “Small Town,” “Hurts So Good,” “Check It Out,” and many others. And the fame hasn’t belied the image: All you have to do is get to know his largely Indiana-bred band to find that his preference for honesty, loyalty, musicianship, and local talent runs deep.

Case in point: Having been in the band for two years, keyboardist Troye Kinnett is still the new guy. Musical director and guitarist Mike Wanchic’s been in the band for over 30 years, drummer Dane Clark for 12. Everyone in the band’s been playing on sessions and in other bands together for years, and they’re all part of a vibrant music scene that encompasses Bloomington, Indianapolis, Fort Wayne, and, over in Ohio, Cincinnati. Getting into the Mellencamp band isn’t about having the right connections: It’s a factor of friendship.

Troye, hailing from Muncie and trained as a composer and a jazz pianist, landed a staff position at an Indy studio, writing jingles and TV spots and doing post-scoring around 1990. As the top call drummer in the area, Dane Clark was Troye’s first choice for his own sessions, and over the years they worked a lot together, as well as with others who were in the band at the time, such as John Cascella and Larry Crane. When the keyboard chair finally opened up in 2006, it was Dane who recommended Troye for the gig. “I planned to write music, whether for TV or songwriting,” explains Troye. “But I really wanted to play in a rock band! I always figured that composing is what I’d fall back on after my rock years. As it turned out, I did that for 20 years until I finally got a real job!”

Interestingly, the squeezebox played a pivotal role in Troye’s employability. “Most of the reason I got my foot in the door was because of my accordion playing,” he says. “I was filling in on the rehearsals of The Ghost Brothers of Darkland County, which is a musical that John is writing with Stephen King. Well, 14 of the 16 songs were on accordion. There were four days before rehearsals began, and for three of those I had scheduled a trip to New Orleans to move my grandparents back up to Indiana, following hurricane Rita. So I took the accordion with me, and I rode in the back of my brother’s truck, practicing the whole way down, so I’d be ready for Monday morning’s session.”

A consummate professional, Troye was ready to play anything when he got into the band. But as prepared as he was, he had some very important lessons to learn about John Mellencamp’s music. “I thought I’d be more of a rhythm player,” he says. “But I’m not a rhythm player in this band; I play colors and melodies, and hook lines.
“I also really had to learn how to tame the B-3 once I got in this band,” he admits. “I usually play it hard like it’s a piano. But I saw your Chester Thompson videos on Keyboardmag.tv, and he had such a light touch! I was thinking, ‘Hey, I don’t need to break my fingernails playing this thing!’ It doesn’t equate to volume. But when the emotion in the song comes up, you’ve gotta play hard, and hang on to the chord for dear life!”

When it came to the heart and soul of John Mellencamp’s music, however, Troye had more to assimilate than just instrumental skills. “The first tour I did was great, the parts were already done, I just had to play them as arranged,” he says. “But it was during the recording of Freedom’s Road that I really learned how to play for this band. I grew up listening to the music of the ’70s and ’80s, but John’s music is really rooted in the ’60s. And I was initially having a hard time coming up with the right parts. On his iPod, John has the Billboard Top 100 songs for every year for the past 50 years or so. So he’d pull up 1966, and we’d listen to what the hits were. Sometimes John would play the tunes for me right in the session, or he’d say, ‘Here, take my iPod home with you.’ I was able to play anything, but it’s a matter of communication; it’s finding out what needs to be played that’s hard.

“Al Kooper, Garth Hudson, those were names that came up quite a bit, guys who I had to channel, the tones I needed to learn to get. I listen to them now, and I think, ‘How did I miss that?’ It’s great now to read a review of the CD or of our concerts where the reviewer says, ‘Great Dylan-esque organ.’ Okay, I’ll take that! It doesn’t sound like me, maybe we’ll get there someday.”

The recording of Freedom’s Road was a band effort, with rehearsals for working out all the parts and arrangements. The approach to Life Death Love and Freedom was totally different. “John brought these songs in, and you could tell he was kind of an open book with the songwriting — these were so powerful,” says Troye. “T Bone Burnett was producing, and he had John’s original vocal and guitar tracks as the rhythm tracks. And then we added things on top of those. John would have an idea, like, ‘Why don’t you play a melodica part on this song.’ So I’d come up with something, and T Bone would usually just say, ‘That’s beautiful. I can work with that.’ Then he’d go and add his other parts, like his baritone guitar with the tremolo here and there. But he wanted to get our parts the way we heard them.”

The album has a very distinct sound, due in part to Troye’s keyboard parts. “The field organ worked on a lot of stuff,” he explains (see sidebar, “Field Work”). “John is the one who wanted the field organ. We used the melodica, B-3, and tack piano.

“For the live show, I sampled the sounds myself. I saw where [engineer] Mike Piersante miked the field organ, and I just stuck a Shure Beta 58 in the same place, and it worked. I sampled straight into the Motif. There was a lot of button pecking and dial spinning while I set loop points! It was tedious. But I knew this would be the most foolproof way to get these sounds into the live set.”
Troye Kinnett has blossomed into his role in the John Mellencamp band with his blend of musicianship, open-mindedness, and hands-on hard work. But the real secret ingredient to a great show? “You always want to have a little bit of adrenaline,” he says. “Before the show, you just listen to the crowd out there, and then go out and play every note like it’s your last one.”


Troye plays a field organ on many of the tracks on John Mellencamp’s Life Death Love and Freedom. A field organ is a pump organ designed to be taken out onto the field of battle to play religious services for the troops; they were used in WWI and WWII. It’s lightweight, folds up into a carrying box, and has a distinctive, haunting sound.

Troye’s rig in the John Mellencamp band is based around John’s classic, if distressed, B-3 that runs through a Leslie 122 just upstage. The B-3 is stock, save for a Leslie footswitch speed control modification; the Leslie has two Shure Beta 52a mics mounted in the case to catch the high rotor; another is mounted in the bottom to pickup the low rotor. Troye starts off with two basic drawbar settings: 88 8008 33 with the second harmonic percussion, fast decay, and chorus C1; and 32 0867 220 with chorus C1. “I’ll pull out a couple of high stops for a solo,” he says, “then go back to what I have set.” On top of the B-3 is a RAM-packed Yamaha Motif ES6 (John’s is shown; Troye’s is backstage, just in case). Troye loads it with his own samples of a field organ, Wurly, Mellotron, Vox organ, and other sounds, which he keeps on a Kingston Data Traveller flash drive. “I’ve got one of those onstage with me at all times,” says Troye, “and there’s always another one back in the keyboard case, with our tech, John Gabrielli. So if anything happened to the keyboard, we could rent another one that was loaded with RAM, load it up and have all the same sounds.” Troye’s main Mellencamp axe, though, is his Baldoni accordion, equipped with Baldoni’s own mkII mics: two condensers under the grille on the right-hand side, and one on the bass side, with separate volume controls for each. The accordion signal goes through a mute pedal switch and then into an Ampeg SVT preamp before going direct into the board.

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