Meet Our Teachers
John Lamb is the founder of Backbeat Music Academy, and is dedicated to setting students up to achieve whatever they set their goals on. This means breaking down barriers – developing the physical skills, the mental tools and above all, mindset to get past the roadblocks to success.
John has taught for over 20 years, has a Masters in Education, graduate-level certificates in eLearning, Training and Development and Teaching Adults, and a B.S. in Music, Psychology and Biology. He has also studied with Bernard Purdie (Steely Dan, Aretha Franklin, James Brown). He has played professionally around the US and Asia, starting when he was 15 years old.
John teaches nationally, doing clinics and master classes around the US and Canada. These are mostly around his book, Anatomy of Drumming. John Has also written several other books, including Anatomy of Guitar Playing, Start Playing Drums and The Boots And Cats Book which just came out this year. He also writes regularly for DRUM! Magazine and Computer Music Magazine. John endorses Remo Drum Heads and Tama Drums.
Sofía Nava Ulaciois a Venezuelan musician, singer, and songwriter. Her passion has led her to pursue a career in the music industry, getting different awards and scholarships, and participating through mentorships and projects with different artists and organizations in the US and Latin America. As a child, Sofía always had a great interest in music and at only 5 years old, learned her first song on guitar by herself. Later, Sofía was accepted to study at the advanced music school “Fundación Niño Zuliano” in her hometown, Maracaibo. A school that belongs to “El Sistema”, a recognized organization for having trained great musicians and conductors such as Gustavo Dudamel. Right there, she studied for 5 years, getting involved in guitar, cuatro, cello, and participating in youth and children’s choirs and orchestras. Currently, Sofía is studying Music at PCC with the plan to attend a 4-year college for music, while she works professionally as a highly demanding Latin songwriter, music teacher, independent artist, and multi-instrumentalist. Some of her recognitions include: • Two time consecutive winner of song-writing contest in Maracaibo, Venezuela, 2018-2019. • Winner of the award and scholarship “Beaverton Youth Arts Award 2023” in performing arts, offered by the City of Beaverton, Oregon. • Finalist for “Best Music Video” at the Signal2Noise Film Festival 2023. • Selected as one of the 5 “Leading Ladies Connect TogetHER 2023” mentees: a mentorship sponsored by the Latin Recording Academy. Sofía is also a Latin Grammy Member.
Dave Fleschner has toured with the likes of The Pointer Sisters, The Steve Miller Band, Grammy Nominated Earl Thomas, Curtis Salgado (John Belushi’s inspiration behind the Blues Brothers), in addition to performing with B.B. King, The Portland Symphony and many, many more. Dave is also in demand as a producer, composer, arranger, and music director. He’s he has composed music for several documentaries and short films. On stage, his partnership with playwright Wayne Harrell has resulted in writing music for three different musicals: Buried Fire, Just This One, and Gospel Blues. He has been in the pit orchestra for Jesus Christ Superstar, Always Patsy Cline, and for many of the Portland Gay Men’s Chorus shows.
Dave is also the music director and teacher for United by Music North America, a non-profit that teaches non-neurotypical musicians and finds them high-profile performances. Dave’s taught music for decades, including composition, film scoring and music theory classes on the college level. documentaries and short films.
Kynwyn Sterling is a drummer/multi-instrumentalist. She graduated from California Institute of the Arts in 2018 with a BFA in Jazz Performance. You can see her perform on NPR’s Tiny Desk Concerts with Naia Izumi, or catch her with the progressive synth-pop band Crying, the math rock duo Standards, or others, including her own band Heirloom. Kynwyn endorses Aquarian drumheads. and is a co-founder/administrator of Odd Times and Atmospheres, an online community and resource for progressive and experimental musicians.
William Keyn began playing and writing music when he was 12 years old. His main instrument is guitar, but he is a multi-instrumentalist and singer coming from a classical background. The son of an international symphonic conductor, composer, and professor of music; he was born in Norway and travelled across the world experiencing a myriad of musical styles and experiences. At 19, soon after Immigrating to the US, he was already playing with some of Portland’s finest musicians. He performed with Latin performing groups to local Jazz, Experimental, Rock, and more. A decade later, he began music producing and producing albums for up and coming artists as well as his own compositions and has been producing ever since. His diverse background has given him a unique and eclectic perspective of performance, producing, and music instruction. He’s been teaching music for twenty years.
Luciana Proaño is a dancer and percussionist from Peru with an extensive career as a in Europe, Mexico, South America and the US. She performs solo and with Inka Jam, whose music includes originals from the band members and some traditional covers in a variety of styles with an Andean flare. Many of the pieces also include a dance performance in traditional costume. In her teaching, she takes a student-led, Montesorri-style approach oriented towards getting her students to understand music. She also focuses on developing growth-mindset and strives to create an environment where students feel OK to make mistakes and learn to grow from them. She also may include dance in her lessons if she feels it appropriate or the students are interested.
Sami R. Shkolnik has been teaching music for serval years in California, and recently moved up to Oregon. She holds a BA in Piano Performance from Mills College, where she won the Flora Boyd piano performance prize. Sami has studied with noted teachers such as Belle Bulwinkle, Svetlana Elenkova, Natallia Lobenberg, and Ruzanna Farmazyan. In addition to music, Sami is passionate about animals and animal welfare. She volunteers for PMR horse rescue in her spare time and studies dressage horseback riding. She also holds an MBA in marketing from Mills College.
Turner Williams is a young up-and coming producer, writer, known drummer and teacher. He has been hitting the Portland scene since middle school and has been known as the smiling face on the music scene. While playing everything from jazz to soul to time bending funk, he is on his way to becoming an essential part of the Portland music scene. His explosive and energetic style of drumming has allowed him to play with some of the Portland greats such as George Colligan, Darrell Grant, Ed Bennett, Devin Phillips, Joe Manis, Dayna Stephens, Charlie Brown 3rd, Noah Simpson, Alan Jones, Dan Balmer and more. Since he started playing music it has been his mission to play time bending, against the grain, beautiful music while at the same time making the audience dance, sing and smile. As well as this he strives to become a teacher that helps build and strengthen the still growing music scene in Portland and beyond, making efforts to learn as much as he can so that he can better inform and teach any student that comes his way no matter if they’re old or young. Through his efforts he hopes to spread joy throughout the community while becoming an ever present force spreading hope and happiness.
Matthew Stanbro
Dustin Silva is a composer, singer/songwriter and poet. He studied at Musician’s Institute in LA as a teenager and won a summer scholarship to Berklee College of Music. His interest in Indian music led him to study at the Ali Akbar College of Music. As a teacher, Dustin specializes in injury prevention and recovery with an emphasis on proper body mechanics. His expertise in this area comes from 7 years of study under somatic educator and Body Mapping expert, Lisa Marsh.