Robby Steinhardt once blamed being a member of Kansas for encouraging bad habits in his violin playing. “It wasn’t the band’s fault,” he insisted in 1981. “But I naturally tended to hold my violin onstage so I could hear what the rest of the boys were doing. That meant I was touching the instrument in a way that meant I couldn’t be anywhere near my best.”
Steinhardt was a virtuoso musician. Born in Chicago on May 25, 1950, he was classically trained and began violin lessons when he was eight.