[1] Kitchen is known for his extensive recording portfolio of organ music, and his research and demonstration of historical keyboard instruments.

[2][3] He made major contributions to the discography and scholarship on the organ works of William Russell,[4][5] and Johann Ludwig Krebs.

His doctoral thesis (approved 1980) was titled "Harpsichord music of seventeenth century France: the forms, their origins and developments, with particular emphasis on the work of Louis Couperin (1626–1661)".

From 1988 to 2014, he was Senior Lecturer in Music at the University of Edinburgh, teaching harmony, counterpoint, keyboard skills, history, and performance practice at all levels.

[22] As part of this project, Kitchen authored a detailed essay about Russell and his music, with information about every single Voluntary (including the disposition of the organ and the registration of the Voluntary)[23][24] Kitchen has studied and recorded the complete organ works of Baroque composer Johann Ludwig Krebs (1713–1780).