CRUISE SHIPS

Kier started appearing on cruise ships in 1998. He's done about twenty contracts working for Renaissance, Princess, Disney, Celebrity Cruise Lines. These engagements have taken him to India, Africa, South America, and of course all over the Caribbean.

He often finds himself appearing in front of multi lingual audiences from all over the world. "You learn fast in that kind of situation. Every night is like a little puzzle you have to solve."

COMEDY CLUBS

The first time Kier walked on a comedy club stage (Jerry Farber's Place in Atlanta, 1992) he thought it would be much harder to make people laugh compared to clubs and colleges. He quickly realized that's all wrong: People who go to a comedy club are completely prepared to - laugh!

"It was such a rush, I was thinking - I need to do this a bunch more, and I've been doing it ever since!" (Thanks Jerry Farber!)

"No matter what else I do, I'll always go back to comedy clubs. That's where you get to sling around the paint with abandon and you almost always end up with something interesting on the canvas. And it makes all my shows in other touring venues so much better."

Voted the 1993 NACA Coffeehouse Entertainer of the Year and nominated over a dozen times in various categories over roughly ten years of touring.

"This is where I really learned how to do a SHOW. Music clubs don't allow a guy much opportunity to find himself as an entertainer, but the college tour always gave me a great audience night after night ."

Doing about thousand college shows was an experience that prepared Kier for everything that has happened since. "I learned so much doing all those colleges... and had a blast. I grew up in a college town (Clemson, SC) and I never visited one campus during all those years where I didn't feel right at home."

After departing college Kier spent a few years playing solo clubs around the Carolinas, when he and his best friend Lew decided to go to NYC. "We made it as far as Boston." he says with a straight face.

Club work in Boston and on Cape Cod continued Kier's apprenticeship. Tips earned from playing on the street in the dead of winter on Harvard Square and in the subway (the Green Line on the T, if you're a local) served as dinner money on more than one cold night.

"Standing on stage in a club next to Fenway Park, catching the first confusing, unthinkable news of John Lennon's death on a TV behind the bar is a memory that's seared in my mind forever. Aside from that, Boston was a great time in my life."

He headed back south the following year gigging extensively in Myrtle Beach and Hilton Head and this is when Kier started hitting his stride as a club musician.

Influenced by Jackson Browne and Dan Fogelberg who both played piano as well as guitar, Kier knew one day he had to add piano to the show. "I could barely play back then, but I memorized about ten songs by rote and tried not to look scared. If I ever got lost in the middle of one of those piano songs I was totally screwed."

With the whole family very musical, a dad who sang in barbershop quartets all of his life, and a mom who played piano and sang, music was a pretty easy choice. Starting on trumpet in sixth grade band gave Kier a solid base to start from but after his older brother Kevin taught him to play guitar it was all about The Beatles (still is) and songwriting.

Singing rock and pop with his brothers and Barbershop with Dad, the family group could occasionally be found entertaining at a beauty pageant or street festival belting out harmony. The name of the group?... Three Lads And A Dad. Pass the apple pie please.

After his freshman year at Clemson University Kier was offered a voice scholarship from both The University of SC and Winthrop College. He attended the latter.

After leaving college he went back home and worked in a textile mill to raise money to buy a proper sound system. The minute he had earned enough for a PA he quit and hit the road. He swore that would be the last regular job he would ever work. It wasn't the last... but it was close.

Kier insists to this day that once he heard his father say, "Before you rush into college, give Rock and Roll a chance." His father denies it.