Courtney Kenny, Irish by birth, studied at the Royal College of Music in London, England. He began his career as an operatic coach and pianist, working initially in the field of light music and musical theatre. His first job was as Musical Director with the famous Bristol Old Vic Company, which gave him his life long interest in show music. Then he joined the world renowned Glyndebourne Festival Opera in Sussex, and has since worked with many opera companies in the UK and elsewhere. He formed his own opera company in his home town in the West of Ireland, worked for 25 seasons over 30 years with the Wexford Fextival Opera in Ireland, and was Head of the Music Staff with the New Sadler's Wells Opera (an operetta company) in London. For nine years he ran the Opera Department of the Blossom Festival School of the Cleveland Orchestra and Kent State University and has been associated with the Ohio Light Opera in Wooster, OH, since 1983. However, his love of light music never waned, and since 1962 he has been enjoying a simultaneous career as a cabaret entertainer, giving concert of Songs at the Piano. He appears regularly in the Purcell Room, the recital hall at London's South Bank Centre, at the Jermyn Street Theatre in London, and at the famous Pizza on the Park Cabaret Room near Hyde Park Corner. He appeared at the Mabel Mercer Cabaret Convention at Town Hall NYC on numerous occasions, at several cabaret roomes in New York (most recently at Danny's Skylight Room in May 2005), studied at the Cabaret Symposium at the Eugene O'Neill Theatre Centre in Connecticut, and for the past six years has made an annual tour on the USA, visiting places as far afield as Florida, Massachusetts and Ohio. His programmes always show an enquiring mind, and he performs many lesser known songs by the great song writers, as well as much contemporary cabaret material. He is particularly associated with the songs of Sir Noel Coward, and has released a CD of 22 songs under the title of "Mad Dogs and Englishmen", which has been received with great acclaim. PRESS NOTICES. the late Richard Kennedy, producer "Cabaret Thirteen" Thirteen-wnet. "Thank you for a delightful evening. Your diction, your phrasing, your style allowed me to know that these qualities do not exist only in my imagination - that they are real indeed, and that there are some performers still displaying them." "Back Stage", NYC John Hogland - The Cabaret Convention. "Several performers new to our city stood out ... Ireland's Courtney Kenny, who showed us some definitive Noel Coward." Musical Opinion, London. "Leaving the theatre after two hours of this sort of thing you couldn't help detecting the audience's disapointment that the evening had to end somewhere." The Edmonton Jopurnal, Alberta. "...his rendition of "Don't Put Your Daughter on the Stage, Mrs. Worthington" is probably the way Coward intended it to be: funny, sharp and down-right bitchy." CD review - "Show Music" Fall 2001 "Devised and performed by UK Cabaret Artist Courtney Kenny to celebrate Sir Noel Coward's centenary, "Mad Dogs and Englishmen" reminds us again of the Master's winning way with words and music. ... Kenny is effective in comic numbers, delivering Coward's witty, often risque lyrics with relish. Kenny provides his own piano accompaniment for his winning programme." That's it. Many thanks, Courtney Kenny.