Born and raised in the Philadelphia area, “as a kid I listened to rock ’n’ roll, my parent’s classical music collection and whatever else was on the radio,” says Kimbel.

“I discovered the music of the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, Peter Paul and Mary, The Weavers and, through them, songs by Bob Dylan, Reverend Gary Davis and Robert Johnson, although I did not really know who they were by name.”

Andy Kimbel began playing the guitar and piano when he was about 8 and by 11, was playing in a band. In his early teens, he got an electric guitar and started gigging at various functions in the Philadelphia area.

Andy later went to school to pursue a career in aviation and become an instructor and jet pilot, flying various types of equipment for several carriers during his tenure.  It wasn’t until a pilot furlough at the early 90s that Andy picked up the guitar, went out and played thinking that it would give him something to do until he got back into the flight deck. He would also frequent various clubs and coffeehouses watching and learning from performers like Garnet Rogers, Doc Watson, Chris Smither, Tom Rush, David Bromberg, Jorma Kaukonen and the late Bill Morrissey. It was then that the call of the Philadelphia and New York blues and singer-songwriter scene grabbed Andy and brought him in as a performer at these same venues as he garnered much press attention along the way.

Kimbel keeps his audiences enticed with a great flow and versatility as his fingers move effortlessly across the neck of the guitar while singing and picking rhythm patterns and leads simultaneously improvising with his own compositions and a selection of traditional standards. Hailed as "a musicians musician", much of his performance is on-the-fly, making it almost impossible to hear the same song played twice the same way.

Over the past 30 years both solo and on occasion with his Andy Kimbel Express band, Kimbel has played many Festivals, Special Events, Folk and Blues venues. Whether it be a performance for 40 people at a folk club or house concert, thousands at a festival or millions on television as he did regularly on QVC earlier in his career, Kimbel makes the stage his home and it shows.

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