Cover Story: Kenny Wayne Shepherd • 30 Years of Ledbetter Heights
Kenny Wayne Shepherd
Growing up, blues-rock guitarist Kenny Wayne Shepherd was privy to a wealth of musical knowledge, as his father, Ken, was a local radio personality, a part-time concert promoter, and an avid music collector. These behind-the-scenes experiences led the youngster on the path to a future in the music business. “I would say yes, although I didn’t realize it at the time,” Shepherd explains during a recent phone interview. “I was so young, and my dad was always taking me with him to every concert that he went to. I spent a lot of time up at the radio station with him, and it was music 24/7. I was watching bands perform and seeing how they did what they did, and getting to go backstage and meet band members and see behind the scenes of the touring industry and all that. But I didn’t know at the time that I was absorbing all of that, and it was going to influence who I was going to become as an artist.”
After meeting blues guitar god Stevie Ray Vaughan in 1984 at one of his father’s promoted concerts at the age of seven, Kenny knew he had to buckle down and start learning his craft. “After seeing him, it lit this fire in me that I have got to learn how to play something like that,” Shepherd remembers. “What I saw that day is what really gave me the motivation to sit down and put in all the hours of practice, because it takes a lot. Nobody wakes up and just knows how to play an instrument. But watching him gave me all the motivation that I needed.”
HONORING THE ’HOOD
On Sept. 19, 1995, Shepherd released his stellar debut full-length album, Ledbetter Heights, at just 18 years of age. The album’s title is an homage to the historic black downtown neighborhood in Shepherd’s hometown of Shreveport, LA, and also pays tribute to blues legend Huddie “Lead Belly” Ledbetter.
The album became a surprise yet immediate success, achieving Gold status (selling over 500,000 copies) within months and Platinum by early 1996. **Ledbetter Heights* went on to achieve an unusual level of commercial success for a blues album, especially considering Shepherd’s age. At the time of its release, the young guitarist had no idea what to expect. “We finished the record, and I turned it over to the record company, and I remember just having this feeling of… I’ve done all I can do; now it’s out of my hands,” Shepherd admits. “(I didn’t) really know what to expect or how the people were going to react to it, or if anybody was going to care, or if anybody was going to play it on the radio or not. Thankfully, they put “Déjá Voodoo” out and sent it to radio stations, and at Rock Radio, it started to run up the charts, and it ended up going up to number five. (Then we knew) We had something going.”
As a self-taught guitarist, Shepherd took all of his musical influences—which span from everyone from James Brown, Jimi Hendrix, and Led Zeppelin, to Stevie Ray Vaughan, B.B. King, and Howlin’ Wolf—and stirred them up in a big pot, which gives his particular style a fresh take on contemporary blues.
TAKING IT TO THE STREETS
To celebrate Ledbetter Heights‘s 30th anniversary, the Kenny Wayne Shepherd Band will be heading out on an extensive five-month North American tour beginning in February of 2026. Shepherd and his band will be performing two complete sets each night; one featuring *Ledbetter Heights* performed in full (although not in sequential order), and a second set spanning selected highlights from Shepherd’s 11 other studio albums.
Shepherd explains the reasoning behind the projected setlist. “We’re not going to do it in the same exact order, but we will be playing every song off the record. I think that the order on the album is great for the album, but I don’t know if it’s the best order for a live performance. I found that out a couple of years ago when we did a 25th anniversary tour for my second album Trouble Is… . The first few shows we played it in exactly the same order as the record. Then I just felt like it didn’t flow the way I wanted it to for the live show, and then I mixed them up and put them in the order that I thought would be best for the live concert. And that felt much better. So I already know that’s going to be the case this time, but we’re going to play every song off the Ledbetter Heights record without a doubt.”
Select dates on the Leadbetter Heights 30th Anniversary Tour will feature very special guests as the opening act. Jimmie Vaughan, founding member of The Fabulous Thunderbirds and older brother of Stevie Ray Vaughan, will be performing on some dates, while Eric Johnson will be featured on the other dates. Shepherd admits that he has a great relationship with each musician, and loads of respect is evident between the three of them. “One of the cool things for me personally about this tour is that I was doing shows with both of those artists in the early days of my career,” Shepherd confesses. “In Jimmie’s case, I was doing shows with him before my first album came out. Even after my first album came out, I was doing shows with Jimmie Vaughan and Eric Johnson, among other people. So, there’s a connection there, going back to my first album and my first tour.”
MUSICAL COMRADES
Although Shepherd is the focal point of the band, the camaraderie and musical chemistry shared between every member form a special bond. Co-vocalist/rhythm guitarist Noah Hunt—who has been in the KWS Band for nearly 30 years—will be performing Ledbetter Heights live on this tour for the first time, as the album featured vocalist Corey Sterling initially. In addition, Shepherd’s longtime drummer Chris “Whipper” Layton—formerly of Stevie Ray Vaughan & Double Trouble—has been with the guitarist since the Ledbetter Heights era and remains a crucial part of the band’s sonic arsenal. “We’ve worked very hard over the years to create a very professional environment for all of us out here on the road,” Shepherd states. “Chris and I go back to my very first album, so he and I have been making music for 30 years now. Chris was Stevie Ray’s drummer for the entire Double Trouble existence. That’s amazing because I grew up learning how to play guitar by playing along with those records. So, I was very comfortable playing along with Chris Layton behind a drum kit when we first started playing music together, because I had been playing along with his records for so long. And Noah’s been with me for 28 years. We’re kind of like a big family, and we have a lot of history together. So, it’s nice to have those kinds of people out there.”
The other members in the KWS Band include veteran musicians featuring bassist Kevin McCormick (Melissa Etheridge, Nils Lofgren, Jackson brown), keyboardist Joe Krown (Chuck Berry, Bo Diddley, Mavis Staples), trumpeter Doug Woolverton (Aretha Franklin, Gov’t Mule, J. Geils), and saxophonist Charlie DiPuma (John Legend, Eric Gales, Herbie Hancock).
MIDWESTERN MEMORIES
The Leadbetter Heights 30th Anniversary Tour kicks off Feb. 19, 2026, in Dallas and runs through June. Although Shepherd doesn’t have any actual Chicago dates, local fans have plenty of chances to catch a show in nearby Gary, Indiana; Milwaukee; Champaign; Carterville; and Rockford. Over the years, Shepherd has played numerous shows in the city and has captured many fond memories. “One of my more interesting memories is that the last New Year’s Eve show that we ever did was in Chicago in 1999, going into the year 2000, when it was a big deal (Y2K), and everybody thought everything was going to crash,” Shepherd remembers. “I also opened the House of Blues; I played the opening night of that venue with James Brown and the Blues Brothers. We’ve played the Chicago Theater many times over the years, and they have a blues festival in the city that we’ve also played. There’s just lots of great history there, and we have a great fan base that we have relied on now for three decades that continues to show up and support us. If we’re not in the actual city itself, we’re playing in the… You guys have so many different suburbs; the surrounding areas in different towns. And we always come through to some degree every year.”
NOW AND BEYOND
The KWS Band has released two new albums in the last two years, with Dirt on My Diamonds Vol. 1 in 2023, followed by Vol. 2 the next year. However, Shepard will be releasing a rerecorded version of Ledbetter Heights next year.
Oftentimes, when a band re-records a classic album, it can be a double-edged sword for its fans. On one hand, the fans know and appreciate the spirit of the original, while the musician desires a better production, or there’s a copyright battle between the band’s record label. However, Shepherd assures me that the spirit of the originals hasn’t been drastically compromised. “We went into the studio, and we did a whole new version of the record,” he confesses. “What’s interesting about it is, Noah was not the lead singer in my band on my first album. Noah joined my band on the second album. And so a lot of people over the years have been curious as to what that record would’ve sounded like if Noah had been the singer in the band at that time. So now they’re going to get a chance to hear that. And on some of these songs, we gave them a slightly different treatment. There’s going to be some different guitar solos and maybe some different endings and some different arrangements here and there, but without alienating the beauty of the originals. It brought up a lot of memories for me, rerecording this record, and it took me back to the experience of making my first album.”
According to Shepherd, he just built his own recording studio, giving him the freedom to record music anytime he desires. Plus, the guitarist has been busy with various collaborations with other musicians and writing for a brand-new KWS album. “I just did a blues record with Bobby Rush (**Young Fashioned Ways*). He’s a blues legend, and that came out back in March,” he admits. “And we did a whole tour this year and brought him out with us. He and I were talking about doing another record; we’re hoping to get that done in the next couple of months. It’ll be another traditional blues record. I also have this really cool rock and roll covers album that we’ve been working on with these really interesting cover songs that I grew up listening to from all these different bands. Then I’ve been in writing sessions for the past several weeks, writing new material for whatever the next new record is going to be. There are tons of ideas and material that’s taking shape that’s going to set us up for the next several years to come.”
– Kelley Simms
Appearing April 24 at Hard Rock Casino Gary, IN. And April 30 at Pabst Theatre, Milwaukee
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Category: Cover Story, Featured, Monthly
