Some musicians play a song. Kenny Peagler starts a conversation.
A Pittsburgh-born, classically trained pianist and one of America’s most respected Hammond organists, Peagler has spent over thirty years performing across stages in Europe, Asia, and beyond — bringing deep fluency in jazz, gospel, soul, and R&B to concert halls, festivals, and intimate venues around the world.
Raised in a city that produced Billy Strayhorn, Art Blakey, and Ahmad Jamal, he trained at Pittsburgh’s High School for the Creative and Performing Arts before studying at the New England Conservatory. That foundation carried him to Carnegie Hall, the Umbria Jazz Festival, concert halls across Europe and Asia, a performance for President Barack Obama at the NAACP Bicentennial Celebration, and a Barclays Center stage for 20,000 fans. He is also a recipient of the Presidential Lifetime Achievement Award.
As an educator, his Learn the Hammond series has surpassed one million combined views, inspiring working professionals and first-time players around the world.
His vocal album, We Are Just Human, arrives June 12. Produced by fellow Pittsburgh native Poogie Bell, it features Marcus Miller (multiple Grammy winner and architect of Miles Davis’s Tutu), five-time Grammy winner Victor Wooten, Grammy-winning bassist Will Lee, Grammy-winning Yellowjackets co-founder Jimmy Haslip, Grammy-winning percussionist Horacio “El Negro” Hernandez, multiple Grammy-nominated saxophonist Lakecia Benjamin, and guitarist Dean Brown.
Music Connection gave the album an 8 out of 10, praising Peagler’s voice as “strong and warm” and the musicianship throughout as exceptional. SoulTracks described the project as revealing a powerful new side of an artist long admired from the bandstand.
We Are Just Human is Kenny Peagler, fully in his own voice.
