A native Nashvillian, raised in the music industry, and
educated at Vanderbilt University, Kirk apprenticed in 1974 under O.d.V. Palmer, a 3rd-generation piano tuner and technician. After Mr. Palmer's death, Kirk worked at The Piano Research Lab at Baldwin Piano for the noted piano designer, Harold Conklin. Later, he worked as an engineer at the Mason & Hamlin factory in Massachusetts.
In Nashville, he partnered first with composer Michael Bacon, and then with recording pianist Bobby Ogdin to found Nashville's first shop devoted to pianos used in recording studios and other professional environments.
For 39 years, he tuned and repaired pianos for great pianists across the USA.
In 1994, he moved to Hawaii to surf and to dance the hula. While
the Hawaiians were somewhat tolerant of his surfing , one attempt at hula was deemed enough by all involved. In 2014 he followed his wife to her new job in Adare, County Limerick, Ireland: no surfing and no hula so far, but a wonderful place nonetheless.