2026 Inductees

Matt Betton is an American musician, music educator and band leader born May 14th, 1913 in Manhattan, KS. He was also Executive Director Emeritus of the International Association for Jazz Education (IAJE) and founder of Manhattan Enterprises, Betton’s Family Music Center, and Jazz Education Press. In 1938, Betton graduated from Kansas State University with a degree in music education. From 1933 to 1973, he led the Matt Betton Orchestra that played all over the Midwest United States and in 1941, it was designated the Number One College Dance Band in the Nation by Billboard magazine. Over 150 students worked with the band during its 40-year lifespan.
In 1968, Betton founded the National Association of Jazz Educators, later renamed the International Association for Jazz Education (IAJE) and became its Executive Director. Betton is credited with building the organization from the ground up during its first 20 years and establishing its reputation and membership, which quickly grew to 8,000 members in 42 countries.
“Matt’s contributions to the field of jazz education are incalculable,” said IAJE President and Indiana University Distinguished Professor of Music, David Baker. “He and his wife Betty were the rocks in IAJE’s foundation. Without their dedication and personal sacrifice, there would be no IAJE today.”
Betton won many awards in his life, including an honorary doctorate from Boston’s Berklee College of Music and the Kansas State University Alumni Medallion Award. In 1983, he was inducted into the Kansas Music Educators Association Hall of Fame. By 2002, he was presented with the IAJE Humanitarian Award, given to individuals “whose passion for teaching transcends the usual academic environment and exhibits the four elements of humanism: dedication, non-prejudice, altruism, and love.”
Betton was incredibly active outside of IAJE as well. He founded the American Federation of Musicians Local #169 (Manhattan, KS), co-founded the KSU Summer Band Camp, the National Stage Band Camps and the Stan Kenton Jazz Clinics. Betton also served as musical director for NBC’s Joan Fairfax Show
On November 3rd, 2002, after a long and fruitful life, Matt Betton passed away peacefully at a Hospice Care Center in Loveland, CO He was 89

Brody Buster is an American Blues artist and multi-instrumentalist from Paola, KS, who currently resides in Kansas City, MO..
When Brody was just 7 years old, he picked up one of his Mother’s harmonicas and began to teach himself to play. Little did he know that in a short time he would be jammin’ on Beale Street in Memphis, Tennessee and taking the Blues world by storm. He played worldwide and shared both the stage and recording studio with musical legends such as Quincy Jones, The Four Tops, Chaka Khan, Keb Mo and Lee Oskar, among many other greats. As a regular featured artist at BB King’s Blues Clubs, the legend himself took a high interest in Brody’s talents, and took steps to bolster his career many times throughout the years.
In this whirlwind time of his life, Brody was featured on countless TV programs including The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, Dateline, Crook & Chase, Jon Stewart and Full House. At 16 Brody began to change his style, sinking himself into more modern sounding music of the times. He felt the need to live life as a normal teen without music being the focal point, yet he continued to play with friends and create music throughout his formative years.
In 2013 Brody began working on a concept that he called “Brody Buster’s One Man Band,” consisting of himself, his electric guitar and phenomenal harmonica skills, snare, kick-drum and kick-ass high energy.
By 2017 he found himself back in Memphis, Tennessee. This time, he brought his shine to the International Blues Challenge for the Kansas City Blues Society as a solo performer. He had no expectation of winning this highly coveted competition which hosts over 150 high caliber musicians from around the world. However, Brody showed the masses in Memphis that, as an adult, he still had electrifying multi-musical talent. He made his way to the finals and stole the show. “The most talented musician I have seen here,” said Rick Booth, one of the judges at the competition. Brody claimed the 1st place win for Best Harmonica Player and 2nd in Best Solo/Duo act. After such an exhilarating win Brody went on to tour the United States and Canada, making stops at The Montreal Jazz Festival, Tremblant International Blues Festival, Bronze Blues Festival (Oregon), and Tall City Blues Festival (Texas) among others.
During the Global Pandemic and following the death of his brother and a bout with drug addiction, Brody let his musical career fall by the wayside. Starting out as a child prodigy harmonica phenom, sharing stage and studio with legends, then stepping back to live life as a sober adult offstage—it’s the kind of real-life lessons arc that only makes the music sound richer.
Now his latest album, titled “Redemption” blends a newfound maturity, heartbreak, and untamed energy into one compact powerhouse that can only be described as resilience wrapped in rhythm. For more on Brody Buster, including tour dates and a complete discography, visit his website

Since the group’s founding in 1979, Mainstreet has continued its evolution from a jazz quartet into an established and popular six-piece horn band. Drawing from music of the ’60s,’70s, ’80s and more, Mainstreet has performed their signature blend of rock, funk, and smooth jazz for audiences in Northeast Kansas to as far north as Minneapolis. Along with drummer Richard “Felix” Smalley, three former music professors have made up the core of the group for much of its history: Rod Manges (keyboards, vocals and arranger), Daryl Batchelor (trumpet and vocals), and Richard Philbrook (lead vocals, trumpet and trombone). Other members over the years include Tom Hittle, Peter della Femina, Wayne O’Neal, Greg Spreer and Ric Barron (guitar and vocals); Al Thompson, Steve Johnson, Sonja Henning, Andy Bell, Dave Riat, and Frank Valdez (saxophones); Jessica Furney and Sarah Pratt (vocals); Corey Butler,and Howard Bradley (drums), and Kurt Morrow (bass). In 1992, Mainstreet recorded a cassette album that was released in limited numbers for promotional purposes only. In 2005, the self-titled studio CD “Mainstreet” was released. Personell on the recording were Richard Smalley (drums), Kurt Morrow (bass), Greg Spreer (guitar and vocals), Rod Manges (keyboards, vocals and arranger), Andy Bell (sax and vocals), and Daryl Batchelor (trumpet and vocals).
On special occasions, Mainstreet still does live performances. Continually expanding its unique musical appeal to an ever-widening variety of audiences, Mainstreet can always be counted on to do what it does best–make great music.
Mainstreet is on youtube with both studio recordings and live performance clips:
Vehicle
Heatwave

featuring McKee’s highly technical guitar performances have achieved viral fame, garnering hundreds of millions of views collectively.
Self-described as “just this guy from Topeka, Kansas, who kind of blew up on the Internet about a week before Christmas,” McKee became one of Candyrat Records best-selling artists after their video of “Drifting” was promoted by users at Digg. For a time, three of McKee’s videos were concurrently the three most-watched on YouTube. In the wake of this exposure, he appeared by invitation on the TV shows Woodsongs and Last Call with Carson Daly. He also contributed to Josh Groban’s 2007 Grammy nominated Christmas album “Noel,” playing guitar on the song “Little Drummer Boy.” Groban’s album went on to become the best selling CD of 2007, hitting #1 on the U.S. Billboard 200.
In 2010, McKee contributed to Lee Ritenour’s CD “6 String Theory” that also features guitarists like Steve Lukather, Slash, Neal Schon,Tal Wilkenfeld and Mike Stern.
In 2012, McKee played alongside Prince on his Welcome 2 Australia tour. He played with Prince’s band during the concert on “Purple Rain,” “Sometimes It Snows in April,” “Mountains,” “Dance Electric” and “Love, Thy Will Be Done.” He also kicked off the Melbourne concert with “Ebon Coast,” “Drifting” and “The Friend I Never Met”.
Besides steel-string accoustic and electric guitars, McKee also plays both the baritone and harp guitar.
An integral part of McKee’s style of guitar playing is the use of alternate and open tunings, often combined with a regular and/or banjo capo. In 2016, McKee began developing and hosting a series of multi-day guitar workshops (or “boot camps”) through Dreamcatcher Events. His first flagship boot camp, “Andy McKee’s Musicarium,” was hosted at the Full Moon Resort in Big Indian, New York (2016), with subsequent Musicariums being held at the EarthRise Institute in Petaluma, California (2018-2019) and the Hyatt Regency Sonoma Wine Country in Santa Rosa, California (2021).
For more information, including a complete discography plus current tour and workshop dates, visit Andy McKee’s Wikipedia Page and his website

Steven Smith is a musician, conductor, composer and music educator from Olathe, KS. Steven holds a master’s degree in orchestral conducting from Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois, and a bachelor’s in music education from Washburn University of Topeka. He has participated in master classes at the Conductors’ Guild Summer Institute at the University of West Virginia, the Blomstedt Conducting Workshop at Loma Linda University in Riverside, California, and the Escuela de Perfeccionamiento “Vida y Movimiento” in Mexico City, Mexico. While in Mexico, Smith appeared as guest conductor for the Mexico City Philharmonic, and in 1982 was assistant conductor and section violist for the Orquesta Mexicana de la Juventud of Mexico City.Steven has conducted the Olathe Community Orchestra since 1985, and appeared as guest conductor for the Topeka Symphony, the Overland Park Orchestra, the Kansas City Civic Orchestra, and the Kansas City and Topeka Youth Symphonies. Steven founded and conducted the Overland Park Chamber Orchestra during the summers of 1990-94. He’s served as conductor for thirty-seven summer musicals at Shawnee Mission Theater-in-the-Park, earning their Founders’ Award in 1997, while also conducting various other academic productions.Steven was director of orchestras and instructor of music theory at Paseo Academy, (Kansas City’s high school for the performing arts), from 1987 to 2011. Frequently engaged as a clinician, Steven has worked with the Heart of America Suzuki Association, the Kansas City Music Teachers’ Association, the Northeast Kansas Music Educators’ Association, plus the Kansas City and Olathe Kansas public schools, presenting numerous workshops in conducting, orchestra, and chamber music.Steven has been a private instructor of strings and woodwinds for more than 40 years, working at studios in Topeka, Shawnee, Lenexa, and Olathe Kansas, and he currently maintains a studio of violin and viola students at Metropolitan Conservatory in Olathe. For years, Steven could be seen performing around greater Kansas City as a string and/or reed player, arranger, and vocalist with a wide range of music groups playing in diverse styles. From 1995 to 1997, he played saxophone with the Kansas City Chiefs TD Pack Band, also playing sax over the years with groups such as Atlantic Express, Neon Blue, Son Venezuela and others. Currently, Steven maintains his role as founder, leader, and instrumentalist for two early 20th-Century ensembles: the Sunflower Ragtime Orchestra and the Radio Days Orechestra. He also continues his membership in the Silverwood Ensembles (classical), AnnaLee and the Lucky So ‘n’ Sos (swing and jump blues), and Der Alpen Spielers (polka), while still finding time to do the occasional freelance one-nighter. Steven Smith resides in Olathe with his wife, flutist Emily Smith.

Band Bio Paragraph

The Get Up Kids are an American rock band from Kansas City. Formed in 1995, the band was a major act in the mid-1990s Midwest emo scene, otherwise known as the “second wave” of emo music. Their second album “Something To Write Home About” remains their most widely acclaimed album, and is considered to be one of the quintessential albums of the second-wave emo movement. They are considered forefathers of the emo genre, and have been widely credited as being an influence, both by contemporaries like Saves The Day, and later bands like Fall Out Boy, Taking Back Sunday, and The Wonder Years.As they gained prominence, they began touring with bands such as Green Day and Weezer before becoming headliners themselves, eventually embarking on international tours of Japan and Europe. They founded Heroes & Villains Records, an imprint of the successful indie rock label Vagrant Records. While the imprint was started to release albums by The Get Up Kids, it served as a launching pad for several side-projects such as The New Amsterdams and Reggie and the Full Effect. The band departed heavily from their established style with the release of their 2002 album ”On A Wire,” which saw the band take on a much more layered, alternative rock sound. Like many early emo bands, The Get Up Kids sought to dissociate themselves from the term “emo.” Due to internal conflicts, the band broke up in 2005. Three years later, the band reunited to support the tenth anniversary re-release of ”Something to Write Home About,” and soon afterward entered the studio to write new material. In early 2010, the band released ”Simple Science,” their first release in six years, followed in 2011 by the full-length ”There Are Rules.” Their most recent studio album, ”Problems,” which was seen by many as a return to their early style, was released in 2019. For more on The Get Up Kids, visit their Wikipedia page

Daryl Schiff is an American country music legend from Sharon, KS who went on to be nationally recognized, and also happened to be the father of country superstar Martina McBride. Born on November 3rd, 1938, Daryl grew up to become a dairy farmer and cabinet shop owner by trade that moonlighted as a musician, singing and playing country and country rock music. Schiff exposed his children Martin, Steve, Martina, and Gina to country music as they were growing up, with Martina especially taking interest in the music, coming home from school every day and singing along to albums from artists like Reba McEntire, Connie Smith, and Patsy Cline for hours. By the time Martina was 8 years old, she was already singing in her father’s band, The Schiffters, with her brother Marty also performing in the group. Martina would continue to perform in her father’s band, including playing keys and other roles until she married engineer John McBride in 1988, and moved to Nashville the following year. In total, The Schiffters performed nearly every Saturday night for some 17 years at local functions, VFW Halls, Elks Clubs and other venues. After Martina left for Nashville, Daryl Schiff continued to play music around the Sharon, Kansas area. As Martina McBride began to find fame, first as a traditional country performer before going in a more country-pop direction, her father began to find his own level of national fame too. Daryl Schiff would go on to perform on the Grand Ole Opry numerous times, and recorded two albums in Nashville, including 2021’s “Satisfied.” Produced by Martina, the album featured original songs by Daryl, along with selected covers of beloved old favorites. Also featured were performances by McBride and her brother Marty, reprising Schiff family harmonies on songs they grew up singing together like “Heartaches By The Number” and “Satisfied Mind.” On Tuesday, January 14tth, 2025, Daryl Martin Schiff passed away peacefully at his home. He was 86. His last public performance was at the Pratt County Fair on July 23rd, 2022, where he felt the love from over 5,000 of his loyal fans. Daryl Schiff’s family band legacy and mentorship would reach all the way to the top of mainstream country. But it all started in a small Kansas town in a family band, singing for the love of the music.

Joe “Guido” Welsh is an American recording artist, composer, multi-instrumentalist, band leader, recording engineer and producer from Kansas City, who currently resides in Nashville, TN.
Joe dates his desire for a carreer in music to February 9th, 1964, when the eight-and-a-half-year old saw the Beatles make their American debut on the Ed Sullivan Show. At age nine, he got his first guitar and taught himself to play it, along with keyboards and various other instruments. By the time he’d reached his teens, Joe was gigging with various bands and playing solo in folk clubs throughout the KC Metro area. For the rest of the decade and beyond, he would continue to hone his musical skills and abilities, both on stage and in the recording studio.
After a stint in the Navy from 1972 to ’74, Welsh returned home in 1975 to form Trigger Mountain Band which lasted two years and was the first of his many groups. Others following in quick succession were The Artists, Pedestrian (who opened up Side One of the very first of Kansas City’s “KY102 Homegrown” albums), Burn Unit, Household Words, The Fabulous Shakes, Toledo Waltz, and finally The 4 Skinns, his most popular and longest-lasting band of 30 years. Somewhere along the way, Joe acquired the stage name “Guido Toledo,” a name many of his older fans still know him by. All of his groups were featured prominently in Kansas City music press over the years, and would tour all of Kansas and elsewere in the Midwest extensively. By the late ’70s, Welsh was on staff as a recording engineer and producer for many of Kansas City’s top recording studios, including Chapman Recording, Sound Recorders, United Recording, Studio West, and Woodland Sound, plus his own studios. While there, he worked with noted local artists such as The Bon Ton Soul Accordion Band, The Clocks, Plain Jane, The Secrets*, Steve, Bob & Rich (The Rainmakers) and Oleta Adams, who recorded three of Welsh’s songs for her self-titled debut album.
Welch moved to Nashville in 1998, and began his carreer as a recording artist and producer in earnest.To date, he has released 10 studio albums, plus 4 compilations in a wide variety of styles ranging from Rock, R&B, Jazz and Funk, to Americana, Folk, Country, and Pop. His two albums with jazz great Steve Million as the quirky duo “Thelonius Moog” in 2003 and 2005 garnered worldwide attention and praise. His 2012 album “Nothing Left To Say” was put forth for a Grammy nomination, and was the February 2012 Guitar Player Magazine editor’s pick of the month.
All of his albums were accompanied by a stellar array of musicians such as Levon Helm and Garth Hudson of The Band, Rolling Stones’ sax player Bobby Keys, bass player Gary Talent of the E Street Band, Joey Spampinato of NRBQ, Jay Bennett and Ken Coomer of Wilco, John Seigler, Kevin Ellman and Roger Powell of Todd Rundgren’s Utopia, Reeves Gabrels from David Bowie’s band, jazz drumming giant Dave King, noted “Wrecking Crew” members Jim Horn, Richard Bennett and string arranger Jimmie Haskell, plus Nashville session guitarists Kenny Vaughn, Tom Bukovac, and bassist Viktor Krause among many more Nashville studio greats.
Other career highlights include being Walmart’s “rock star” for 20 years, providing original music and performing at Walmart Events worldwide. He appeared in two CNBC documentaries about Walmart, and was featured in a chapter of Randy Cepuch’s book “Lunch With Warren Buffett.”
He also participated in the 2011 documentary “The Cowsills: a Family Band” by interviewing Billy Cowsill shortly before his death, and producing recordings by both Billy and Barry Cowsill at his Brentwood, Tennessee studio.
Over the years, Joe “Guido” Welch has been featured in a number of major periodicals, including Mix Magazine, Electronic Musician, Jazz Times, Keyboard, Vintage Guitar Magazine, and a front page feature in The Wall Street Journal on September 3rd, 2003.
Welch is currently semi-retired, but continues to provide soundtrack music for TV and film in Europe and Asia through his French music publisher.
For a complete discography of Joe “Guido” Welch, visit his bandcamp page