Kenny Rice was born in St. Louis in 1942, grew up in the Kinloch neighborhood, and became a well-known jazz/blues drummer. Rice learned to play drums from Kinloch High School band director Vernon Nashville. He also walked from Kinloch to downtown St. Louis to take drum lessons with Elijah "Lige" Shaw. In one of his first professional jobs, Rice became drummer for Rudy Coleman’s Silver Cloud Blues Band. While he played with Billy Gayles, Albert King heard Rice play and offered him a job touring with his band. In 1961, Leo Gooden asked Rice to join Leo’s Five, the house band at Gooden’s Blue Note Club in East St. Louis, Illinois. The Blue Note Club was a hotspot and popular among blues and jazz musicians from 1950 to 1967. Musicians would often hang out in the club after they were done with their evening's work in Gaslight Square. In the 1970s, Rice formed The Kenny Rice Quartet with St. Louisans Bob Gibson (alto sax), Ray Kennedy (piano), and William Bennett (bass). In the 1980s, Rice joined Johnnie Johnson, who had also played with Albert King, and played at Johnson’s Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction in 2001. In 2016, Rice released House Party, a CD that he produced with recordings covering a period of 30 years.