Steve Walsh

Steve Walsh served as lead vocalist for Kansas, his commanding and assured style turning “Carry on Wayward Son,” “Dust in the Wind,” and “Point of Know Return” into ubiquitous radio fixtures of the 1970s. He later fronted the short-lived Streets and released solo albums at irregular intervals, one of which has appeared repeatedly on “worst album cover” roundups. Born in St. Joseph, Missouri, Walsh moved with his family to Kansas at age twelve. Teenage listening to Vanilla Fudge, the Yardbirds, the Seeds, and Iron Butterfly sparked his own interest in rock & roll, though he concentrated most on piano and keyboards despite a capable singing voice. Answering a newspaper ad for a keyboardist placed by the Topeka-based band Clover, he soon took over lead vocals as well. Clover became Kansas in 1972. Two years afterward their blend of boogie and prog rock earned a deal with Don Kirshner’s label. After two years of touring and two modestly selling albums, 1976’s Leftoverture and its single “Carry on Wayward Son” elevated the group to stardom. Success continued for the next four years, yet internal fractures steadily widened. Walsh released the solo album Schemer-Dreamer in 1980; although it made little musical impression, its overblown cover—merging California bravado with running-shorts excess—became a camp classic among rock historians. Kansas issued Audio-Visions the same year, which flopped commercially. Walsh exited the band a year later to form the straight-ahead rock group Streets. Streets reached the Top Ten in 1983 with “If Love Should Go,” yet their two albums otherwise fared poorly. Streets disbanded in 1985, and Walsh rejoined the re-formed Kansas in 1986, now joined by guitarist Steve Morse. That year the band scored a hit with Walsh’s ballad “All I Wanted.” Later albums and singles failed to chart, but the group remained popular through numerous summer tours in the late ’90s and early 2000s. Walsh issued his second solo album, the expansive Glossolalia, in 2000 on Magna Carta. Five years afterward he released Shadowman on the Bayside-affiliated 33rd Street label. In 2014, after forty-one years, Walsh announced his retirement from Kansas; his final concert with the band took place on August 16, 2014, in Sioux City, Iowa, at the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino. He returned with his fourth solo album, Black Butterfly, in 2017.