Kevin Garcia is a Detroit born drummer/percussionist, recording artist, composer, producer, studio engineer, foley artist, and educator residing in Brooklyn, NY. Kevin currently performs and records with Duncan Sheik, Wheatus, MC Frontalot, Sky White Tiger, Gato Loco (Coconino y De Bajo), Clinton Curtis, Clifton Hyde, Pape Armand Boye, Egypt 2000, Holly Brook, David Poe, Lauren Pritchard, Tuba Joe Exley, Bartosz Hadala, Tin Pan Alley Band, MC Lars, Hannah Cohen, and The Crazy Piano Guy. Kevin is the drummer for Duncan Sheik's new musical Whisper House, and the musical Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson, music by J. Michael Friedman directed by Alex Timbers. Kevin is currently scoring a documentary on New Zealand, scoring an adaptation of "Life is a Dream" (Calderon) with playwright Christopher Oscar Pena, and scoring a new Webcast called 80/20.
Kevin accompanies dance and composes music for The Merce Cunningham Dance Foundation (staff), Jeff and Yukie Moen, Saeko Ichinohe Dance Company, Harkness Dance (staff), Arts Connection (staff), Steps On Broadway (staff), Limon-Peridance (staff), NYU Tisch, Alvin Ailey, Mark Morris, Paul Taylor, Julliard, Marymount College (staff), Hunter College, Barnard College (2003 composition artist in residence), Long Island University, Sean Curran, Kevin Wynn, Milton Myers, Gil Stroming, Mike Minnery, Mandy Moore, and Class Class Class (staff).
Kevin has appeared on: MTV, VH1, Fuse, ABC, NBC, CBS, Fox, Late Night with Jimmy Fallon, Fearless Music, Austin City Limits, Cochella, South By South West, Donauinselfest, CMJ, The Good To Go Tour UK, The Get Happy Tour UK, The Midwest Music Summit, Rock Propulsion Fest, Pheonix Fest, PASIC (International Award for Best Percussion Performance 1999), Sound on Sound, World Cafe, NPR, WKCR, WNYC, Nashville Radio, Radio Krakow, BBC 1, BBC Wales, Radio Koln, Mountain View Radio, and WRIF, movie soundtracks include April Showers, Little Spirit, and The Journey, the video game Rock Band, Wheatus' "Teenage Dirtbag", and commercial work at Duotone and several other jingle studios. He has also appeared in Rolling Stone, Vogue, Paste, Filter, NME, Mojo, Drum!, Downbeat, Mix, Playbill, and Black Velvet magazine, The New York Times, The LA Times, The Chicago Tribune, The Detroit Free Press, Timeout New York, The New Yorker, The Village Voice, USA Today and other US and international publications. Kevin has recorded for Sony, Columbia, Winter and Winter, Atlantic, Montauk Mantis, Blacktop Records, 27 Sound, Liminal Arts and other lesser known indie labels. Kevin has entertained Bill and Hillary Clinton, and various Kennedys.
Kevin holds degrees from Western Michigan University in Percussion Performance and Philosophy. Kevin attended The Lake Placid Institute for Composition and Improvisation, and Halewynstitchting Conservatory in Belgium for Jazz, Ghanaian, Togolese, and Cameroonian Percussion Performance. Kevin also studied in-depth for six years with the great Billy Hart (Miles Davis, Herbie Hancock, James Brown, Wes Montgomery, Otis Redding, Smokey Robinson, Antonio Carlos Jobim, Pharoah Sanders, McCoy Tyner, Stan Getz, David Fiuczynski.). Teachers of note Kevin has studied with: Judy Moonert, Boris Amontete Tchango, Dre Pallemaerts, Omar Faruk Tekbilek, Ustad Mulazim Hussain, Mridangam Master Guruvayur Dorai, Francis Kofi, and Cameroonian Master Drummer Zoumana Dembele.
Kevin performs and records on drum set, hybrid kits, hand percussion, classical percussion, electronic instruments, sound creation/manipulation software, marimba, vibraphone, piano and anything that can be struck, shook, tapped, smacked, plucked, bowed, or brushed.
Kind words for Kevin's playing:
I love Kevin because he really cares, and it shows in his playing.
-Gerry Leonard "Spooky Ghost"(Guitarist David Bowie, Rufus Wainwright, Duncan Sheik, Suzanne Vega)
When I hear Kevin play, I don't miss African drummers. Kevin is the man.
-Pape Armand Boye (Senegalese Singer/Songwriter)
Kevin kills it. I mean drags it out by the hair into the middle of the street and beats it to a pulp with a large frozen ham and then slices it and dices it with a turbo ginza and then puts the remains in a composting heap to use to fertilize a pretty tree kind of kills it. And killing is his business and business is good.
-Rich Stein (Lauryn Hill, Zakir Hussain, fellow Gato Loco drummer)
I hear Ornette Coleman in Kevin's playing somehow.
-Pierre Dorge (Legendary Guitarist and leader of New Jungle Orchestra)
Kevin's playing is so clear and beautiful it's like the yellow brick road, except it's paved with gold and platinum and diamonds and rubies.
-Kristina Berger (MMC, Horton Solo Prima Moderna)
No matter what you put in front of Kevin, he's going to make it sound like a million bucks.
-Matt Stein (27 Sound, Producer)
