Once upon a time

The piano never had a chance. Picture petite Katelyn Benton smashing its derelict uprightness with everything she’s got. Feel the resonant clangs and spontaneous, guttural tones approaching the work of David Byrne’s art organ.

Splitting time between Colorado and Baton Rouge with her divorced parents had an unusual effect on Benton’s music career. The 22-year-old classically trained pianist got her first spate of recognition for a song she penned in response to the Columbine High School massacre in her tweens. Soon after, the singer-songwriter released her debut Sycamore Street, then in 2007 she graduated from Berklee College of Music in Boston.

After college, she moved back to Baton Rouge, worked for PreSonus Audio Electronics and penned songs for Once, an EP-sized offering produced by Jeremy Lawton of Big Head Todd and the Monsters that she now hopes will get her music placed in television and film.

Benton now lives in Los Angeles, a town she’s grown to love after moving there ready to trash it, she says. She coaches a high-school track team part time and plays as the house pianist at Culver Hotel. The bar is next to the Sony Pictures lot, almost within earshot of the studio executives and music supervisors she wants to attract.

“Pursuing a record label is not even in my realm of consideration at this point, because I know better,” she says. “But as a songwriter you can do so much if you learn the different cracks to get in there. You can make a good living.”

The Culver Hotel gig is a four-hour set, just long enough to test even the endurance of an accomplished long-distance runner. Benton competes in ultramarathons and other distance events every few months.

She has spent the past year playing alone, but plans to put a band together soon, one like the trio she performed with at Berklee. She doesn’t sound rushed, though. If her career has one asset, it is time.

“I’m still the youngest person in the room usually,” she says of industry meetings. “But I feel like I’ve learned a lot and I know what I want, and I’m not going to let that be an excuse to get trampled on.”

The dusty keys cry out in pain as Benton lays her wooden rod into the instrument like a Louisville slugger speeds toward the pitch. Turns out all that piano violence is for Benton’s first video, “Impossible Love.” The song is one by the Subdudes’ John Magnie, one of her early mentors. Wherever she’s been, Benton’s talent has attracted those who want to help her career. In March she drove out to an abandoned house in the California desert with a handful of friends to film the clip.

“I had a friend who was a director and wanted more experience, and a cinematographer who wanted experience,” Benton says. “No one charged me for their time. It’s a great time to be in an art scene when you’re young because you can all work and grow together.”

Benton performs live at Chelsea’s Café Aug. 20, katelynbenton.com