Cody Kilby
9th Annual Americana Album Nominee
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Genre: Americana
Cody Kilby
www.codykilby.com
ARTIST BIO:
The careers of many child stars are often short-lived when the attention fades; and to continue to stay at the top of their field requires more and more work, often with fewer incentives, many never reach the next level of performance. Not so with Cody Kilby, perhaps because his early success was due to his natural genius being matched only by equal parts determination and discipline.
By now, the boy-wonder beginnings of star instrumentalist Cody Kilby are well-known to fans of bluegrass and acoustic music; a true prodigy, he picked up his dad’s banjo at age 8 and by the time he was 11, he had a Gibson banjo endorsement. He started playing his mom’s guitar at 10, and by 17, he was the National Flatpicking Champion. He added mandolin and Dobro around age 13, and at 16, recorded Just Me, showcasing his mastery of all the instruments on the recording. He was at home in the spotlight, competing under the pressure of many prestigious contests, performing at the Grand Ole Opry and on television shows like TNN’s Crook and Chase and Dick Clark’s Prime Time Country. But Cody’s early success didn’t spoil him for the hard work and dedication of the life of a professional musician, it only fueled his passion for exploring the endless potential of music, and more and more, he found his dreams were inextricably bound to the creative process of playing.
When Cody walked through my door for the first time to audition for our band, he was unabashedly sporting a shiner from a slight altercation the night before, and somehow that blackened eye was a fitting symbol for his nature: a scrapper, ready for anything, not willing to back down. Even as he picked his mandolin in my kitchen, he sat on the very edge of his chair, eagerly leaning forward on the balls of his feet, as if he was ready to spring at the slightest provocation. As he flew through the changes, clean, fluid notes streaming from his instrument, I sensed more than his obvious virtuosity; there was a quality about his playing, about him, that I could only think of as… “hunger”. He has an insatiable appetite for music, for musical ideas and techniques, and he consumes every new challenge. When he picked up his guitar to play lilting lines while I sang the song we’ve recorded here, “She”, I knew he was more than an intense, lightning-fast player; he was a complex and complete musician, and I was privileged to have met him and played with him.
Since then, he’s proven himself as an ensemble player as the respected and valued lead guitarist in the Grammy-winning instrumental powerhouse band, Ricky Skaggs & Kentucky Thunder. These days, he finds himself playing beside his heroes, experiencing musical highs like trading solos with virtuoso legend Bruce Hornsby the other night in New York City. He’s called to produce and engineer recordings on his rare spare moments at his home studio.