About The Pianists
David Mauk has been a working musician for the past twenty-nine years. He started taking piano lessons at age six and the French horn at age ten. He learned all the brass instruments before joining his first working band at the age of fifteen. In his senior year of high school, he scored a rating of “1” with a piano performance at state music competitions in the most difficult category.
As the 80’s rolled around he joined a Cleveland, Ohio favorite rock band, “Champion”. In 1986, Champion recorded an album on the California-based Quicksilver label, produced by Freddie Salem of the Outlaws. David joined the sing-along world in 1991 at the Howl at the Moon Saloon in Cleveland. During this period, David taught himself how to play the ass guitar, rhythm guitar, the drums, how to orchestrate, and devoted as few years to writing a Broadway-type musical based on H.G. Welles, “The Time Machine”.
David relocated to Los Angeles, California in 2000 to open the Hollywood “Howl at the Moon” dueling piano bar, inside the City Walk complex at Universal Studios. In 2004, he took the big plunge and relocated to Las Vegas, Nevada. David’s latest projects include composing and recording the soundtrack for the international King Tut museum exhibition.
Billy Kraus was part of the Brian & Joe Radio Morning show between 2000 - 2004. The radio show was ranked between 3rd and 6th in the Cleveland market during that time. I was an on -air personality every Friday morning from 7-10AM as a musical guest playing and singing original parody material and creating and performing interesting comedy skits…..most of them live and “off the cuff”. Billy still performs with Brian & Joe as a member of their live band “The Endorsements”.
Billy started playing for hundreds of companies and private events back in 1995 and is well known in the greater Cleveland area as “The Piano Man”. This notoriety garnered him many appearances on local TV shows and he was the piano accompanist for the local “American Idol” type show “Cleveland Idol”.
In 2000 he began performing his original kid's show called “Kid Rock”. This is a high-energy show that motivates kids between 2-7 to sing, dance, and be silly. Billy performed the show at nearly every library branch in the greater Cleveland and Akron areas along with elementary school systems and various children’s groups.
