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Steve Knight
Steve traded his skateboard for a Synsonics/JCPenney guitar (with built-in, 9 volt-powered speaker) in the early 90s, much to the delight of his mother. At Emporia State University, he split his time between the theatre department and the music department, playing in pit orchestras, the big band, and the faculty combo, all the while teaching guitar at ESU Academy and Flint Hills Music.
Steve’s first step into the professional jazz world came in the living room of noted jazz pedagogue, author, and guitarist Dr. Wayne Goins at Kansas State University. Wayne’s unique approach as a professional first, academic second, inspired Steve to pursue the music further by moving to New York where he was lucky to study with luminaries in the field like Jack Wilkins, Mark Whitfield, Peter Bernstein, Mark Sherman, and Jim Ridl.
Steve moved to Chicago in the spring of 2016 and began teaching and playing full time, further refining his craft with the help of local jazz heavies Scott Hesse, Jim Trompeter, Ernie Adams, and Henry Johnson. His debut album, Persistence, releases August 12 everywhere.
Steve plays Collings and Benedetto guitars, Henriksen and Fender amps, and Dogal strings.
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Steve Knight: For Years Gone
by Kyle Simpler
Chicago-based jazz man Steve Knight started playing guitar when he was 12 years old, and as he puts it, traded his skateboard for an inexpensive guitar, which “was quite righteous-sounding playing 'Smoke on the Water.'" He has come a long way since then, and For Years Gone offers plenty of evidence to prove this. Knight's self-produced 2022 debut Persistence (Self Produced) struck a chord with jazz guitar fans, and his sophomore release shows him developing his ...
Continue ReadingSteve Knight: For Years Gone
by Thierry De Clemensat
If you have a fondness for albums imbued with a nostalgic air, this one should resonate with you. Writing for All About Jazz, Jack Bowers described the previous album, Persistence (Self Produced, 2022), as: “captivating on every level--harmonic, melodic, rhythmic... This entire production works beautifully, regardless of one's particular taste in guitar heroes." Here, the art of crafting an acoustic trio takes center stage. Steve Knight never seeks to dazzle the listener with ostentatious virtuosity, though he possesses ...
Continue ReadingSteve Knight: Persistence
by Jack Bowers
Yet another guitar-led trio, this one by Kansas-born, Chicago-based Steve Knight who also writes in the manner of one of his role models, George Benson (Knight composed seven of the album's dozen numbers including two versions of “Sharps Disposal"). Although the recording's title refers in part to the eighteen months it took Knight to write the song “Persistence," it could well signify how difficult it is for jazz musicians to make a decent living these days or to find a ...
Continue ReadingSteve Knight: Persistence
by Richard J Salvucci
Readers have surely heard of a “sniff test." It is an informal assessment that something, particularly in finance, just does not look right. It is usually intuitive rather than formal. But many analysts employ one before turning to more elaborate kinds of examinations to verify their suspicions. Music has no sniff test, but it does have a “sit still test." Can one sit still while something plays? If not, that is probably a good thing, unless it is ...
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