DR. ANDY P. SMITH, D.M.

Director of Percussion Studies

Smith lives in El Paso, Texas, with his wife Amy Smith (Caixa Trio) and their children. There, he serves as Director of Percussion Studies at the University of Texas at El Paso. Smith taught as Adjunct Percussion Instructor at Middle Tennessee State University from 1999-2008 and serves as the Percussion Instructor for the Tennessee Governor’s School for the Arts, a state sponsored program for elite college-bound musicians.

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His career has taken him from the recording studios of Nashville, TN to Tanglewood, Ravinia and the Hollywood Bowl. He has traveled to Ghana West Africa and the Caribbean to be immersed in African diasporic rhythm. In 2012, Andy was awarded a Tinker Foundation grant to study contemporary Brazilian jazz drumming in São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

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Other recent performances include the Jazz Education Network Convention, the Percussive Arts Society International Convention, the Lotus Music Festival, El Paso Symphony Orchestra, and grant sponsored workshops with Bernard Woma, Musical Ambassador to Ghana.