Brandon Kaltenbaugh

BIO>

Brandon Kaltenbaugh is an American drummer and songwriter. His drumming career began when he was 8 years old. A gift of chopsticks and his dad’s used briefcase served as his first drum. Instinctively, he began to utilize the chopsticks as drumsticks on the briefcase. His father introduced him to the music of Buddy Rich. He spent countless hours watching and surveying footage of Buddy Rich, Neil Peart and other professional drummers.
 
His mother bought a used, children’s drum kit for him, from a friend. After less than a month of practice on that, the cymbal became as wavy as a potato chip. It became clear, Brandon needed a REAL drum kit. For Christmas in 2012, Brandon received a vintage Rodgers kit and began to attend weekly, formal drum lessons in May 2013.
 
Shortly thereafter, he was invited to attend a Rock School program at his local music school. The school assisted student musicians to form bands and at the end of the two months of practice, the bands performed on stage at a local venue. Brandon had his stage debut playing, “Sweet Home Alabama”, “Whatsername”, and finished with “Wipe Out”. The packed house went crazy. He quickly outgrew practice and performing with musicians of the same age and after just a couple performances at a large, local venue, Kaltenbaugh began performing on stage with high school, college and adult musicians.

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Since that first experience on stage, he has performed live in many other local venues, small and large. He has enjoyed studio work and writing drum music for some original songs. His former band gigged in several local venues and was invited to compete in Battle of the Bands, Pittsburgh. Hangwire, with Brandon on the kit, was voted Winner of Battle of the Bands, Pittsburgh Finals and as such, qualified to compete in Regionals.

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Kaltenbaugh began to experiment with various genres early on. His taste in music evolved from classic rock, to where it is today, Metal. He believes the Metal genres are fast-paced, challenging and complex, especially for his instrument of choice, the drums. Major early influences for him were Megadeth, Havok, Slipknot, Dream Theater and Metallica. Presently he is influenced by Opeth, Gojira, Havok, Immortal, Meshuggah and more. Currently, in addition to his focus on Metal, he is studying other genres of drum music including Jazz and Funk. He enjoys incorporating some of the qualities of these other genres into his original work on the drums as well as blending aspects of these styles into Metal pieces.

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In addition to his regular weekly lessons, Kaltenbaugh also began work with another School of Rock program. During his first day there, he was invited to participate in their House Band program and has been, and will continue to be, taking the stage in a variety of venues with them. He really enjoys showcasing his double bass pedal prowess and attends as many drum clinics as he can. His favorite clinics to date, have been led by Todd Sucherman, Drummer for Styx and Chad Szeliga, Drummer for Black Label Society and formerly of Breaking Benjamin.

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Kaltenbaugh was born on September, 10, 2002, in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.