Ryan Kisor was born April 12, 1973, in Chicago, Illinois, and grew up in Sioux City, Iowa, learning trumpet from his father, Larry Kisor, and playing in a local dance band by age ten. In 1990, at seventeen, he won the Thelonious Monk Institute's trumpet contest, a victory that launched his career and led to a contract with Columbia Records, which released his first two albums, 1992's Minor Mutiny and 1993's On the One. He then entered the Manhattan School of Music, studying with Lew Soloff among others.

In 1994 Kisor joined the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra, where he has performed section work and solos, and in recent years has added lead trumpet playing to his repertoire. He has performed and recorded with the Mingus Big Band, the Gil Evans Orchestra, whose own career is covered in full in his JazzProfiles.com profile, Horace Silver, Gerry Mulligan, and Charlie Haden's Liberation Music Orchestra, whose own career is covered in full in his JazzProfiles.com profile, as well as the Carnegie Hall Jazz Band and the Philip Morris Jazz All-Stars.

As a leader, Kisor has recorded fifteen albums in all, including Battle Cry (1997), The Usual Suspects (1998), and Point of Arrival (2000), many featuring his own compositions.

Kisor's early Thelonious Monk Institute victory launched a career spent largely within the great American big-band tradition, from the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra to the Gil Evans Orchestra and Charlie Haden's politically charged Liberation Music Orchestra, establishing him as one of the most consistently deployed lead and solo trumpeters of his generation.