Kyle Bronsdon

Kyle Bronsdon is not the world's greatest drummer.

He's not the best singer to come out of the Swing Renaissance, either. He isn't exactly a chick magnet, and he will probably never light his drums on fire or climb up the side of the stage into the balcony. But if you could seem him alternately laughing and weeping at his piano at home, you'd see just how deeply he enters the writing process. This process has changed dramatically since a recent stylistic expansion.

"I realized halfway through writing [solo debut Kitchen Swing, 2003 Vitalegacy]," he says, "that although I love novelty tunes and swing dancers, I wasn't expressing the pithier and more personal things I wanted to say. You don't hear that done in swing, and you don't hear humor and storytelling in mainstream jazz."

Bronsdon made his solo debut on Hollywood's Sunset Strip, at the Argyle Hotel's third anniversary celebration of retro culture’s Atomic Magazine, within a month of relocating to Los Angeles from Tucson. His swing trio, Kearney, Grams & Bronsdon (a/k/a "The KGB Trio") had just been awarded the 2002 TAMMIE (Tucson Area Music Award) for Best Traditional Jazz artist.

The drummer formed KGB after the three left Arizona's premier swing band the Kings of Pleasure, which Bronsdon joined in 1998, at the peak of the Swing Renaissance. He toured regionally with KOP (who won the TAMMIE for Best Swing Band during his tenure), often performing at LA's legendary Derby. KGB became instantly popular with Lindy Hoppers and went on to perform at dozens of regional events for the swing scene that had by then gone back underground from whence it came. The trio was a regular favorite at Phoenix's annual New Year Swing Jam with Lindy pioneer Frankie Manning. Bronsdon recorded two albums with KGB, "Nine Waters, No Tip" (1999) and "To Go" (2002 Vitalegacy).

A veteran of the Chicago music scene, Kyle has dedicated over half his life to the drum kit. He studied composition with Stan Kenton arranger Bill Russo and Moog pioneer Hans Wurman, and perfected his shuffle sitting in with myriad Windy City blues artists, including James Cotton, at the historic Checkerboard Lounge, where only the most dedicated white musicians dare to play. He remembers, "I was afraid Killer Ray Allison was gonna crack my crash cymbal," and that his time on 43rd and Martin Luther King taught him the value of guts, honesty, and the backbeat, which he has carried with him to the present.

Today he pulls all his resources together performing, promoting 2004's "All About the Burn", and even scoring for film like a recent project for USC's Institute for Creative Technologies with director Randal Kleiser (Grease). He has little, if any doubt of the value of the music he plays. "It's jazz, there's humor and soul in the material, it's accessible and it's danceable. And that's what I want to do, take jazz back to the street -- and keep it there. With all these born-again patriots lately," he muses, "you'd think that America's original music, and greatest cultural contribution to the world, that everybody would be listening to new retro-style stuff and doing Lindy Hop. Fortunately," he adds with a smile, "there will always be a niche of people with good taste."

He describes his playing style as "like breaking out of jail."