LARRY PHILPOT
Kenny Wayne Shepherd will perform in Englewood, March 10; and Morristown, March 12.
With a father who was a radio DJ and music promoter, Kenny Wayne Shepherd began seeing concerts at the age of 3. But it was one show at the age of 7 that changed the trajectory of his life.
The young Shepherd saw Stevie Ray Vaughan perform in Shreveport, Louisiana, and was blown away.
Shepherd — who will bring his Kenny Wayne Shepherd Band to BergenPAC in Englewood, March 10, and The Mayo Performing Arts Center in Morristown, March 12 — says he was impressed by “the raw emotion and energy that (Vaughan) was able to convey and put forth through his instrument, and the effect that that had on me. So my goal was: I don’t want to be anybody else other than myself musically, but I did want to affect people the way he affected me.”
While Shepherd listened to all sorts of music, he there and then became a bluesman, teaching himself to play guitar and getting his first standing ovation in a New Orleans club at the age of 13.
His current tour celebrates the 30th anniversary of his debut album, Ledbetter Heights, which he will play in its entirety, along with a set of other hits. The 1995 release skyrocketed to the top of the blues charts when the guitarist was still only 18, and went platinum; in May, he will release a remake of it.
“My intention was always, hopefully, to write timeless music and record timeless music that people could enjoy for decades,” Shepherd says. “I’m so really proud of that album — the way that it sounds, and what we accomplished with it.
“There were a lot of first-time experiences for me, making this record.” Remaking it, he says, “really kind of put me back into my 17-year-old self and my life back then. And that only has served to give me even more gratitude.”
The cover of Kenny Wayne Shepherd’s “Ledbetter Heights” album.
Though Ledbetter Heights brought him to prominence in the blues world, the young guitarist continued to study the blues and celebrate those who came before him. Shepherd says about listening to blues icons such as B.B. King and Albert Collins, “I would feel something inside myself when I was listening to their music. And so I realized that when they’re doing that, it’s generally not when they’re playing this big flurry — a fast bunch of notes. It was really when they were playing very few notes, sometimes only one note that they were just playing at the right time in the right way, that you could just feel their soul pouring forth.
“So that’s what I focused on. One thing that I am able to do is to really convey emotion through the instrument to the listener. A lot of that is just channeling. I don’t know how to tell you how to do it in words, other than just trying to be a conduit and just tapping into this part of yourself. And then just channel it: channeling that through your instrument and the music, and then out to to the crowd.”
Shepherd’s second album Trouble Is … (1997) became the longest-running No. 1 album on Billboard magazine’s blues chart, and he is perennially at the top of lists for best blues guitarists.
From the start, Shepherd played blues music that was infused with the electric energy of rock. He has opened for The Rolling Stones, Aerosmith and Van Halen. Next year, he will release an album of covers of rock songs.
“Blues is a huge component of what we do,” he says. “But we’re not just a blues band. We love to rock, and we can rock with the best of them.” He counted off choices that may surprise fans, including songs by Billy Idol, Pink Floyd and Genesis.
“There’s some that kind of make more sense, but there’s definitely some head-scratchers,” he says.
Kenny Wayne Shepherd with Bobby Rush.
Shepherd — who is now 48, with six children — says: “My whole life, people made such a big deal about how young I was … It’s almost like you instantaneously go from being the young guy to now, you’re part of the older crowd, and there’s no in-between. But it’s cool. At the end of the day, the biggest takeaway is that I’m still here, and I’m still able to do music, so I’ll take it. Plus in this kind of genre, generally, people think you get better with age, so that’s good.”
In 2007, Shepherd played with elder bluesmen such as Clarence “Gatemouth” Brown and Pinetop Perkins for a documentary and album called “10 Days Out: Blues From the Backwoods.” In March 2025, Shepherd released an album, Young-Fashioned Ways, with the then-91-year-old Bobby Rush, and it was nominated for a Grammy Award in the Traditional Blues Album category.
“All my friends were always decades older than me — people I associated with, people I made music with,” Shepherd says. “Nowadays, I still do that, but that’s just to make me look younger.”
The Kenny Wayne Shepherd Band will perform at BergenPAC in Englewood, March 10 at 7 p.m.; and The Mayo Performing Arts Center in Morristown, March 12 at 7:30 p.m. For more about him, visit kennywayneshepherd.net.
_____________________________
CONTRIBUTE TO NJARTS.NET
Since launching in September 2014, NJArts.net, a 501(c)(3) organization, has become one of the most important media outlets for the Garden State arts scene. And it has always offered its content without a subscription fee, or a paywall. Its continued existence depends on support from members of that scene, and the state’s arts lovers. Please consider making a contribution of any amount to NJArts.net via PayPal, or by sending a check made out to NJArts.net to 11 Skytop Terrace, Montclair, NJ 07043.
