Kyle Knutson

Although he spent a great deal of his earlier childhood growing up outdoors on a family farm in rural South Dakota, by age eleven, Kyle Knutson began taking an interest in music and of learning how to play his father’s guitar. Initially, his father showed him the few chords he knew how to play from various Merle Haggard and Hank Sr. three-chord country songs. However, it did not take long before playing the guitar and writing songs quickly grew into a passion that occupied numerous evenings spent in his upstairs bedroom. Eventually, he went on to discover new influences from veteran songwriters and various blues artists featured on Austin City Limits and radio broadcasts of Beale Street Caravan. By the age of twenty, Kyle found himself performing in many venues across South Dakota including Jazzfest that is held every year in Sioux Falls drawing attendance levels of over 100,000 through the duration of the two-day festival. Drawing from the experience of his former days of acting on the stage all through high school, Knutson is a natural when it comes to entertaining a live audience. By incorporating the guitar, harmonica and raspy vocals into a blend of blues and folk music, Landin E. King, a local newspaper critic of Murfreesboro had this to say upon seeing him at a live concert: “Knutson sounds like he was born and raised in downtown Memphis. Beale Street and the blues are obviously a huge influence over Knutson’s songwriting.” Aside from a performing aspect, his lyrical muscles also have the ability to shine through and capture an audience’s attention. Writing songs that convey a wide range of emotions, he often evokes moments of laughter along with reflective moods of sadness from his listeners. In one song, “The Old Banister,” he provides a very sentimental and lifelike portrayal of a banister from his early childhood home. For years it’s lived quietly upstairs Now like an old worn out man, nobody seems to care Some said it was unsafe and had to retire So they tore it all apart and tossed it in a fire In the fall of 2007, Knutson migrated south to Nashville to pursue a Recording Industry Degree with an emphasis in Songwriting from Middle Tennessee State University. Currently, Kyle spends a great deal of his time writing songs and performing throughout South Dakota and at various locations around Nashville.