AUSTIN — After 85 years playing the piano, Kenneth Schara doesn’t put much thought into his craft. When he sits down at the keys, it just happens.

“You’ve got to get the feel of it first,” Schara recalled about learning the piano.

At 92, Schara has played piano in all types of settings — homes, piano bars, care centers and churches, to name a few.

Though he grew up farming near Decorah, Iowa, and cut meat for 30 years at Hormel, there’s a bit of irony with Schara’s story. Through all the hard work, he never damaged his most valuable asset: his fingers. It was a piano that got him.

Schara recalled playing at a party on one occasion. He didn’t feel anything but when he looked down, it was an ugly sight.

“When I got done, I noticed my fingers were all blood,” he said.

They were cut by broken glass that was strewn about the keys. That didn’t cut his talents short, however.

Schara played a couple of songs in the community room at the Courtyard recently. As soon as he hit the seat, he played a song, which blended into another — all without a pause.

“I come down here and play quite often by myself,” he said, after playing just 1 percent of the songs he knows by heart.

Since he was 7, Schara has played piano. He’s also played clarinet, trumpet and violin. Though he has read sheet music before, it has been quite some time since he’s actually done that. When he started at age 7, sheet music wasn’t necessary, either.

“I started when I was bout 7 years old, with one finger,” Schara said.

Perhaps experience and talent are more important, as many are always eager to hear Schara’s music.

“We get him to play all the time,” said Bob Davis, Schara’s neighbor at Courtyard Apartments in Austin. “He loves it, it’s in his blood. He never has a piece of sheet music in front of him.”

But even without the sheet music, Schara doesn’t have to stress about what songs he plays. They just keep flowing through his fingers and into the keys.

“Most people, we have to stop and think what we are going to do next,” said Pastor Jeff Forbes of Grace Lutheran Church — where Schara attends and still plays. “But Kenny, he knows what he’s going to do. He just goes right into it.”

Of the 200 songs Schara knows by heart, he can add his own unique flair to each one. He doesn’t have an explanation for it, other than it comes naturally. Forbes could agree with that.

“You just have to have an ear,” Forbes said, who also plays the piano.

Forbes set Schara up with a piano and recording equipment several months ago and cut him loose. About an hour later, Forbes had 24 tracks of early 20th century classics with which to work. The result: Kenny by Heart, a CD that anyone can purchase at Grace Lutheran Church or on reverbnation.com.

“I really like what Kenny does,” Forbes added. “It’s just very entertaining. It’s different. He’s unusual in the way that he just strings songs together.”

Forbes joked that if Schara keeps garnering attention, the Church will have to send him on tour. In the meantime, one can likely find Schara tickling the keys at his apartment or Grace Lutheran Church.