• Michael Garcia

    DRUMS, GUITAR, PIANO, UKULELE, BASS & ARTIST DEVELOPMENT

    Born and raised in Austin, TX, he learned the ins and outs of the music industry right here in the “Live Music Capital of the World.” He played his first original show on historic 6th Street at the age of 15. Starting on piano, then drums, Michael was first featured in Drum! Magazine at age 17. Since then he has played in 13 bands in the Austin area, including Pop, Rock, Metal, Industrial, Punk, Praise and Reggae groups, recording numerous albums while doing so. While performing with Enkindle Crown, Michael toured and played well over 200 shows across the Southern USA. Before playing in night clubs, however, Michael’s first shows were in Marching Band. He made his High School snare line with only 6 months experience, quickly proving his dedication and passion for music. There, underneath the bright Friday night lights, Michael would develop the love for music performance that would influence him forever. In his new project, Michael takes 1 Man Band performance to the next level. He performs Drums, Keyboard, and Vocals simultaneously while juggling on-the-fly looping and occasional stick tricks. Armed with an array of technology, combining electronic sounds with tribal drums, his music is cinematic, energetic, and powerful. Michael is living proof that with enough motivation and heart, any feat can be accomplished.
    In 2010, Michael decided to share his passion for music and opened Out of this World Music School. Inspired by teaching a close friend’s kids to play the drums and guitar, he discovered his true calling and ability to connect music to younger minds. Michael specializes in teaching multiple instruments to individual students, broadening their musical experience all across the board. He has also successfully put together and mentored young bands within his student population. Drawing from Tribal Drum Circle Workshops, he teaches music groups with cues that everyone can understand. Michael is a teacher that puts his heart and soul into every class and lesson.

  • Josh Matthews

    GUITAR, BASS, PIANO, MANDOLIN, BANJO, HARMONICA, UKULELE, DRUMS & MUSIC THEORY

    Although born and raised in Austin, Texas, Josh has traveled around the globe and lived in Australia, new zealand, Scotland, and France. His many adventures have given him the opportunity to absorb and experience a variety of musical cultures. Josh views music as a universal language that can connect us all across continents and borders. Josh began playing guitar at age 12 and quickly realized that music would be a lifelong passion. Eager to learn more, he began playing drums, bass, piano, horns, and anything else that could be an expressive outlet. Over the years, he has played in multiple bands, ranging from blues to metal to country to acoustic singer/songwriter. Whether at local venues, cajun hideaways, or pubs abroad, Josh always enjoys the chance to share music with others. In addition to his own musical endeavors, Josh has produced the works of other artists.  Josh has been teaching music, including guitar, bass, drums, and mandolin, to students of diverse ages for over 15 years. He believes that music is meant to be shared with others and that every individual has something valuable to share. His goal as a teacher is to create individualized lessons based on student interests and needs to help guide his students on their musical journey out of this world!

  • Masehunter Neal

    GUITAR, BASS, PIANO, KEYBOARD, DRUMS, PERCUSSION, SAXOPHONE, BASSOON, CLARINET, FLUTE, TRUMPET, TROMBONE, MANDOLIN, COMPOSITION & MUSIC THEORY

    Masehunter Neal is a native Austinite and working musician with a Bachelor of Arts in Music Theory from the University of Texas at Arlington. She is classically trained on the bassoon through school at Cedar Park High School. She continued playing the bassoon in college and was formally trained in jazz performance on the bass guitar at UTA. She also performed various percussion instruments with the drumlines at both CPHS and UTA. Primarily a bass guitarist on stage, Masehunter has over a decade of experience in teaching any age student with instruments including guitar, piano, woodwinds, brass, and percussion. She has also worked behind the scenes running sound for bands, such as The Pontiax, and composed/produced multiple albums, including Portents+Prophecies by The Pajammas

  • Brooke Harman

    VIOLIN & PIANO

    Brooke grew up in Palmdale, a small Mojave Desert town in southern California. She started playing piano when she was five, violin when she was eight, and trumpet when she was twelve. While her grandmother taught her piano, she took private lessons on violin and trumpet throughout her youth. During her junior high and high school years she participated in community youth orchestras and Solo & Ensemble festivals each year where she received excellent and superior ratings. She was also involved in her high school concert band, marching band, and orchestra all four years. She went on to earn her BA in Music Industry Studies with a focus on violin at California State University, Northridge. Her violin studies were under the direction of Dr. Michael Ferril, and she was in the university orchestra while she attended. Teaching music privately for about ten years, Brooke also currently works at The Austin Harmony Project, a music and art nonprofit for disabled Adults. She is an active poet, music journalist, and musician within the community.

  • Will Sturrock

    VOICE / GUITAR / PIANO

    William is from San Antonio, Texas and grew up in a home that was always full of music! He started playing violin at age 9 and quickly gained interest in performing, joining his church’s children’s choir. Shortly after seeing the movie School of Rock, William picked up some drumsticks and began banging on various items around the house until his parents bought him his first drum kit at age 11. In high school he continued to pursue music by playing drums in bands around San Antonio as well as performing in school musicals.

    After high school, William studied music at UT Austin and received his Bachelor’s of Music in Voice Performance. During his time at UT he not only performed in a number of ensembles, but also discovered that he had a real passion for teaching! Since graduating, he has continued to teach lessons and perform with local bands in Austin. William enjoys teaching many various styles of music and loves working with curious and enthusiastic students to help them grow as musicians as well as people!

  • Malcolm Pinkston

    GUITAR, PIANO & UKULELE

    Malcolm is a versatile musician with an extensive knowledge of music theory, and he is comfortable playing and teaching rock, pop, metal, jazz, blues, and everything in between. He also specializes in helping students to sing and play their favorite songs, as well as write their own original material. He has been teaching acoustic and electric guitar to students of all ages and skill levels for the last 4 years. He created and leads an interactive music therapy group at Texas Neuro Rehab Center. Malcolm believes in individualized teaching strategies that address each student's unique musical goals. He also believes in the importance of developing a strong fundamental foundation of technique and music theory, and, of course, in having fun and enjoying the process of learning and making music. To Malcolm, playing music is one of the most beneficial, therapeutic, rewarding pursuits life has to offer, and he wants to help as many people as possible experience the gift of playing music. His musical mission is to use music to heal, empower, and connect people.

  • Tyler Hyde

    DRUMS, PIANO, GUITAR, BASS, MARIMBA, AUDIO PRODUCTION, GUITAR REPAIR, & RECORDING SERVICES

    Tyler Hyde grew up in Chester, NJ and began playing drums and piano at 8, as well as guitar and bass at age 10. He began his professional career playing with the New Jersey Youth Symphony all the way through high school under the direction of Dr. Kenneth Pasick. He was a music/audio major at Bloomsburg University before moving to Nashville to attend The Blackbird Academy for audio recording. After spending several years in Nashville playing in various bands and operating his home recording studio, House of Tone, he moved to Austin for a variety of different music and recording opportunities. When he isn't teaching, he is recording various other bands in town, mixing, and playing shows

  • Christa Carlini

    Voice

    Christa Carlini was born and raised in Peoria, Arizona into a family with many musical talents. Her love of music and singing started at a very young age, her mother even claimed that she sang before she talked. Her father was an expert at vocal harmonization and composed music on the piano, her grandmother was a gifted pianist, and her aunt was a wonderful vocalist and actress. Looking to these family members as role models, she soon became fascinated with musical theatre and lyric writing. Christa participated in church choir, school choir, and many musicals throughout her youth and adolescence. When she was just 8 years old, she began private vocal lessons with a member of the Arizona Broadway Theatre. She started training in the vocal stylings of Classical and Broadway and worked her way up to Opera. After 10 years of vocal lessons and fine-tuning her ear for pitch, Christa's vocal coach recommended her to Juilliard. Although she was trained classically, Christa has always enjoyed listening to and singing most all other genres of music and looks forward to teaching them as much as well. With her background of working as a nanny and now having her own children, she especially loves teaching children and youth and looks forward to learning from them. Her goal as a teacher is to help her students feel confident in their vocal abilities and enrich their lives with new skill sets to help them on their journey as singers and music lovers.

  • David Hoefler

    GUITAR, TROMBONE, BARITONE, BASS, PIANO, VOICE, AND SONGWRITING

    David grew up in York, a music and arts city located in south central Pennsylvania. He started playing trombone/baritone in fifth grade and guitar in ninth grade. Guitar was self-taught but privately taught lower brass throughout grade school and into college at Millersville University in Pennsylvania where David had musical scholarship. Currently, David teaches private lessons for: guitar, trombone, baritone, bass, drums, piano, voice, songwriting at all age levels. David performs live with his band, Swellin, in Austin and tours but also has his band music released online such as Spotify, iTunes and bandcamp!

  • Krystal Khali

    VOICE / GUITAR / BASS / PIANO

    Krystal Khali is a singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, producer, and entrepreneur. A classically trained guitarist, she began playing guitar at age 12 and joined several garage bands in Orange County, California. Krystal was accepted into the guitar program (GIT) at The Musician’s Institute, a private music university in Los Angeles, at age 19. GIT alumni include Eddie Van Halen, Rivers Cuomo of Weezer, Skrillex, and many others. During college, she started the Musician Institutes first ever student-led weekly blues jam, which is ongoing until today. During the same period, Krystal founded a local live music booking and promotions company, Zion Lion Events, which had a partnership with The House of Blues on Sunset Blvd before its closure in 2015. After graduating from The Musician's Institute, she expanded her live performance and business skills by playing in cover bands both locally and in neighboring states.

    Krystal's breakthrough came in 2015, when blues hall of fame legend Guitar Shorty saw her performing with the decades-long running avant-garde jazz show The Toledo Show, and decided to hire her on the spot. She says the experience of getting hired by Guitar Shorty was a “dream come true,” as she is an avid Jimi Hendrix fan, and Guitar Shorty was one of Hendrix's main influences. Krystal toured locally and nationally with Guitar Shorty for 7 years. After several years of teaching music as well as business classes at academic institutions in California, Krystal began to build her own student roster from her home studio so that she could have more freedom to tour with Guitar Shorty and with her own bands. In 2021 she was scouted to play guitar for rockabilly icons The Red Elvises on their 25th Anniversary Tour.

    Krystal's curricula focuses on foundations and fundamentals such as the GIT method of fretboard organization, music theory, and sightreading, while also making sure to always incorporate a "real world" element such as helping students perform songs confidently in front of audiences, analyzing songs in order to "back-engineer" them for a student's own songwriting growth, how chords and scales should not be viewed as separate, and how to communicate effectively with other musicians. Piano lessons focus on the classical lexicon as well as building a pop repertoire. Lessons are typically broken up into sections such as dexterity exercises and warmups, scales/improv, chords/rhythm, theory, sightreading, and repertoire.

    Krystal moved to Austin, Texas in 2024 after the passing of Guitar Shorty at the age of 87. Khali hopes to refocus on teaching and on the blues community that is so vibrant in Austin, and to take the skills gleaned from the life changing opportunity of sharing stages with some of the best artists of all time and to keep them alive for new audiences all over the world.