Kevin Bales’ career started at the University of North Florida in a budding, if little-known, jazz program. He met and performed with, and went on to record and tour with, a number of monumental artists who had settled into the burgeoning North Florida jazz scene. Giants like Wynton Marsalis, Louie Bellson, Eddie Daniels, James Moody, Ben Tucker, Ira Sullivan, Sam Rivers, and Nat Adderley. He counts among his mentor’s bassist Ben Tucker, multi-instrumentalist Ira Sullivan, guitar legends Nathen Page and Jack Petersen, and the fiercely individual saxophonist Bunky Green. Ten years touring and recording with vocal iconoclast Rene Marie culminated in a Grammy-nominated album. His most recent recording of music composed by Fred Rogers was selected as one of the top 10 albums of 2018 by Cadence Magazine and AllAboutJazz.com.
Kevin has amassed a long list of awards and a reputation as one of the finest jazz pianists performing anywhere. In 1994, less than a decade into jazz, he won the American Pianist Association’s Jazz Piano Competition. In addition to nearly every important jazz venue in the South, he has performed in some of the most acclaimed clubs and festivals in America and around the world: the JVC Jazz Festival in New York, The Bakery in Los Angeles, The Kennedy Center and Lincoln Center jazz series, the Toronto and Edinburgh jazz festivals, and the Moscow Center for the Performing Arts. He will be performing as part of our tribute to Miles Davis and John Coltrane.