Miguel Lyons-Cavazos
…is a musician, teacher, writer and public speaker skilled in many musical genres including Jazz, Brazilian and popular music genres, but who focuses on song drumming on the drum set (musical drumming in Rock, Pop, R&B, Country, etc.–the song-driven genres).
He fell in love with drumming by watching the Eagles perform on television in the 1970s. He states, “It seems silly now, but their drummer, Don Henley, performed a drum roll at the end of ‘Witchy Woman’ and I was like, ‘what was THAT?!?'”
When he was in high school, he joined his local, neighborhood drum and bugle corps, which happened to include on it’s percussion staff future DCI and PAS Hall-Of-Famers Ralph Hardimon and Fred Sanford. As Miguel says, “That time in my life is the foundation of my music knowledge. I often tell people that, after working under Ralph for seven years, ‘if I didn’t become great at music and drumming, it would have been my own fault’. It all started there for me.”
Miguel worked in the corporate sector for 20 years, leaving to develop his skills as a music performer and teacher.
Along with his performing career, Miguel’s organic and unique pedagogical approach brought him to also teach several styles of percussion, including Brazilian Escola de Samba and West African drumming. He has also worked with students with disabilities, for whom drumming helps develop their physical, cognitive and emotional skills.
For Miguel, teaching and performing are two sides of the same coin. “The performing makes my teaching better, and the teaching makes me a better performer”, he states.
As a teacher Miguel approaches learning music as one would learn a language, “first you learn to speak (the language, making music on the instrument) and then you learn to read (books, music notation)” he explains.
He also focuses on a song-driven approach. This is a much more engaging and fun approach, especially for younger students. It also enables the student to achieve early success by performing songs very soon after starting lessons with him.
My greatest joy in teaching is to see my students succeed.
I make sure they are passionate about the music they’re learning. They pick the songs we work on together.
If needed, we simplify the parts for them to experience early success.
