Minnix Music provides high quality music lessons from a 20 + year experienced teacher, entertainer and author. Lessons are fun, and you learn to play what you enjoy! We specialize in teaching people how to play music quickly. We offer lessons for piano, guitar, voice, drums, bass guitar, ukulele, harmonica, banjo, Irish Drum, mandolin and bouzouki. Willy Minnix has been a professional musician and sound engineer. His experience has allowed him to work with artists like the Grateful Dead, Keanu Reeves and Los Lonely Boys and the Indigo Girls. His passion for learning led him to Harvard University to study the unpublished collections of Francis Child, the creator of the Child Ballads. "I aim to help my students rise to a professional level. One of my students (this guy below) has recently gone on to produce with Drake and Playboi Cardi. And hopefully you will go on to work with your heroes as well."
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From the beggining |
Where we are now |
Willy Minnix began his career in music in 1996 when he started teaching friends and relatives how to play piano. His passion for sharing what he learned from listening to great artists like Elton John, Billy Joel, Jerry Lee Lewis and Dr. John, was infectious, and other people quickly began to catch the bug of playing piano and guitar from him. His love of music has allowed him to perform all over the United States as a solo artist and as a worship pastor, as well as running live sound for a number of famous band, including Blues Traveler, the Marshall Tucker Band, They Might Be Giants, the Indigo Girls, the Blind Boys of Alabama and Keb' Mo' to name a few. And he was also able to run sound for several film projects with famous actors like Keanu Reeves, the late great James Cahn, Stanley Tucci and even Kevin Bacon. He also worked closely with Paul Shaffer of Late Night with David Letterman, Saturday Night Live and the Blues Brothers Fame, on a relief concert for the Haitian Earthquake.
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Fast forward to today, Willy continues to share his love and passion for all sorts of music with his students. No matter what genre of music you like, Willy knows tips and techniques that will help you improve in your musical endeavors. His love of music and all things musical have led him to explore the history and physics of music from the halls of Earlham College all the way to the great Library at Harvard College, where he did an independent study on the life of Harvard professor and author Francis Child, the author of the famous English and Scottish Ballads, aka the Child Ballads. You're sure to learn something fun that you didn't know before from Willy!
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Willy has been teaching music for nearly thirty years, carrying on the tradition he learned when his father taught him piano as a youth. He is a multi-instrumentalist with a degree in music from Earlham College in historic Richmond, IN (the birthplace of recorded jazz, and home of 30s era Gennett Records).
Willy is also a published author. He written several books, part of an on going series about open D tuning for the mandolin, entitled "Dead Man's Tuning Vol. 1" and Dead Man's Tuning: Christmas Edition," "Dead Man's Tuning Vol.2 English, Scottish and Irish Ballads," "Dead Man's Tuning Vol. 3 Sea Chanties and Pirate Ballads," "Dead Man's Tuning Vol 4. Hymns," and the best selling "Lyrics and Music: Music Theory for Aspiring Songwriters." They are available for sale at amazon, or can be ordered from your local Barnes and Noble, Borders or BAM. As a father of four children, Willy teaches in a family friendly environment. In the past, Willy offered group lessons, called the Stringed Instrument Workshop, for all ages. At the SIW events, he has taught elementary students as well as adults all the way up to 86 years old! Keep watching for up coming Stringed Instrument Workshops in the future. Willy is a background checked teacher and would love to pass on his knowledge of music to you and your family! |