Researched musician profile
About Mitch Watkins
The Austin Jazz Society’s Hall of Fame biography identifies Watkins as a guitarist who studied composition at the University of Texas while teaching himself guitar. It also records his later appointment as the university’s first jazz-guitar instructor.[1]
At UT, Watkins helped form the Austin jazz group Passenger. The ensemble joined Leonard Cohen’s 1979 tour, beginning a touring relationship that the society’s biography says continued across three further Cohen tours, including the final one.[1]
The society’s 2021 profile documents six Watkins albums built mostly around original music, as well as production work for other artists. His distributor-authorized YouTube catalog provides a route into those leader recordings, while Monks Jazz Club preserves a complete 2021 quartet performance made in support of the Austin Jazz Society’s Project Safety Net.[1][2][3]
Passenger and Leonard Cohen
Watkins’s Austin ensemble Passenger became the band for Cohen’s 1979 tour, followed by three more tours together.[1]
Jazz-guitar teaching
The Austin Jazz Society biography identifies Watkins as the University of Texas at Austin’s first jazz-guitar instructor.[1]
Leader and producer
By 2021, the society documented six albums under his name and production work across several artist projects.[1]