Aug 22, 2025 By Brad Hundt 4 min read

If Ronnie Platt ever finds that he’s not in Kansas anymore, he has a backup plan.

A truck driver before becoming the lead singer of the veteran classic rock band Kansas, Platt still has a commercial driver’s license in good standing. That also means that, if push comes to shove, Platt could pilot one of the trucks that hauls Kansas’s equipment around the country to the dozens of shows it does every year.

“There were a couple of times when it was very close,” Platt said. “If need be, I’m ready.”

With any luck, though, Platt’s Kansas duties will continue to be in the spotlight and not behind the wheel. A Chicago-area native, Platt was recruited to become the group’s lead singer in 2014, replacing Steve Walsh, who was Kansas’s lead singer during its commercial height in the 1970s. Before his gig with Kansas, Platt sang with Shooting Star, another long-running band from the 1970s.

A 63 year-old, Platt remembers listening to Kansas, and particularly its 1976 breakthrough, “Leftoverture,” when he was a teenager. The album reached No. 5 on Billboard’s Top 200 chart and yielded the hit “Carry On Wayward Son,” which remains a staple of classic rock radio.

“I put ‘Leftoverture’ on that turntable, and I don’t think it left for two months,” Platt recalled over the phone recently from his home west of Chicago. “I would sit there and listen to it and try to pick out the guitar chords. … I was so much into progressive music, and Kansas was probably the catalyst for that.”

The lineup of Kansas that Platt fronts includes two original members, guitarist Rich Williams and drummer Phil Ehart. Though it has not been a stranger to the recording studio – its most recent album, “The Absence of Presence” was released in 2020 – Kansas has put most of its energies toward touring, and it will be in the region for two shows this weekend. The first will be at the Capitol Theatre in Wheeling, W.Va., at 7:30 p.m. Friday, and the second at Timber Rock Amphitheater in Farmington Saturday at 7 p.m. Jefferson Starship will be opening both shows.

“Right now, we’ve been concentrating so much on touring and filling our schedule with playing dates,” Platt said. “There’s a lot of gratification that comes with that. This is a road band. This band loves to play live, and it’s hard to pick out time to come off the road and dedicate that time to being in the studio when you love touring.”

Will there be another Kansas album?

“Nothing’s on the schedule yet,” Platt said. “But I could get a phone call tomorrow and that could change.”

At the beginning of the year, it was a question mark whether Platt would be able to tour at all this year. He was diagnosed with thyroid cancer and underwent surgery to have it removed. He explained that it had not spread and he did not need to undergo radiation therapy or chemotherapy.

“My doctor told me that if you are going to have a cancer, this is the one to have,” Platt said.

He pointed out that he has sidestepped some of the vices that are typically associated with rock musicians, and that helped him rebound quickly after the surgery. For example, Platt said his alcohol intake is usually about two or three glasses of wine per year.

“I’ve never done drugs,” Platt said. “I’ve never smoked. I’ve always been concerned about my physical state. I just think a healthy lifestyle really got me through my cancer. And now it just really seems like it was a bump in the road.”

For information on the concert at the Capitol Theatre, go online to www.capitoltheatrewheeling.com. For information on the show at the Timber Rock Amphitheater, go online to www.timberrockamp.com.