Tommy Kessler is an American guitarist from

Springboro, Ohio Springboro is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio. A suburb of Cincinnati and Dayton, it is located mostly in Warren County in Clearcreek and Franklin Townships; with a small portion in Miami Township in Montgomery County. The city is part of th ...

, currently in the new wave band Blondie.

Biography

Kessler joined Blondie in April 2010, replacing guitarist Paul Carbonara who had left Blondie during the sessions for their ninth studio album, '' Panic of Girls'', to pursue other projects. Despite playing on only two songs Kessler was credited as a full-time member in the liner notes. He was trained in classical and Latin guitar. These styles provided a great understanding of music theory and also taught him to read standard notation. Later, Tommy drifted into the direction of the hard rock masters such as Randy Rhoads,

Slash Slash may refer to: * Slash (punctuation), the "/" character Arts and entertainment Fictional characters * Slash (Marvel Comics) * Slash (''Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles'') Music * Harry Slash & The Slashtones, an American rock band * Nash ...

Steve Vai Steven Siro Vai (; born June 6, 1960) is an American guitarist, composer, songwriter, and producer. A three-time Grammy Award winner and fifteen-time nominee, Vai started his music career in 1978 at the age of eighteen as a transcriptionist f ...

, Eddie Van Halen and

Dimebag Darrell Darrell Lance Abbott (August 20, 1966 – December 8, 2004), best known by his stage name Dimebag Darrell, was an American musician. He was the guitarist of the heavy metal bands Pantera and Damageplan, both of which he co-founded alongside hi ...

. His natural talent of learning pieces very quickly by sight reading or memorizing by ear helped him quickly excel in that scene. Kessler's first steady gig in New York City was playing in the word-renowned

Blue Man Group Blue Man Group is an American performance art company formed in 1987. It was purchased in July 2017 by the Canadian company Cirque du Soleil. Blue Man Group is known for its stage productions, which incorporate many kinds of music and art, bot ...

where he played

zither Zithers (; , from the Greek word ''cithara'') are a class of stringed instruments. Historically, the name has been applied to any instrument of the psaltery family, or to an instrument consisting of many strings stretched across a thin, flat ...

guitar The guitar is a fretted musical instrument that typically has six strings. It is usually held flat against the player's body and played by strumming or plucking the strings with the dominant hand, while simultaneously pressing selected strin ...

, bass and Chapman stick. He has also been part of the band in the New York City version of

since 2006. Kessler also performs as a guitarist in the fictional 1980s rock band Arsenal in the Broadway musical, '' Rock of Ages'', a member since it opened off Broadway in 2008. His abilities have resulted in a reputation for excellence that has led to him becoming a highly sought after session guitarist in New York City since moving there in 2005. Being in ''Rock of Ages'' led to him meeting Blondie. He was recommended by the band's keyboardist Matt Katz-Bohen. In 2015, Kessler was asked to be a part of the Fresh Kids of Bel-Air. He performs regularly at

(Le) Poisson Rouge (Le) Poisson Rouge (often referred to as LPR) is a music venue and multimedia art cabaret in New York City founded in 2008 by Justin Kantor and David Handler on the former site of the Village Gate at 158 Bleecker Street. The performance space wa ...

. Kessler served as musical director for the 2011 ''Glamour'' Women of the Year Awards. He has written and produced music for The

Nickelodeon Nickelodeon (often shortened to Nick) is an American pay television channel which launched on April 1, 1979, as the first cable channel for children. It is run by Paramount Global through its networks division's Kids and Family Group. It ...

Network ('' iCarly'' and ''

Victorious ''Victorious'' (stylized as ''VICTORiOUS'') is an American sitcom created by Dan Schneider that originally aired on Nickelodeon, debuting on March 27, 2010, and concluding on February 2, 2013 after four seasons. The series revolves around asp ...

''). Kessler mixed

Joel Hoekstra Joel Hoekstra (born December 13, 1970) is an American guitarist currently in the band Whitesnake. Hoekstra also tours as a guitarist for Trans-Siberian Orchestra. The son of classical musicians, he started out playing cello and piano at a youn ...

's ''Joel Hoekstra's 13: Dying to Live''. Since 2013 he has often worn on stage with Blondie a denim jacket made for him by British artist Ian Berry who is known for his art in denim.

References

External links

*
Rock of Ages

Blondie
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kessler, Tommy Living people Blondie (band) members People from Springboro, Ohio Year of birth missing (living people)