Duane Hargis (’07) is making his mark on the music industry. The alum and master’s student in jazz studies won a Grammy Award this year as trumpet player for Ruben Ramos and The Mexican Revolution. The Austin-based band’s Viva La Revolución won in the Best Tejano Album category.

Hargis, who performed a few solos on the winning album, had followed the band since high school and joined in 2008. On weekends, the group tours Texas and other states, and during the week, Hargis attends classes and plays lead trumpet in the Four O’Clock Lab Band.

“The UNT College of Music has an excellent program that is really demanding, and that creates a reputation that is unbreakable,” he says. “You just have to have the will and passion to keep going.”

Other Grammy winners this year included former students Don Henley with The Eagles, who won Best Pop Instrumental Performance with “I Dreamed There Was No War,” and saxophonist Jeff Coffin ('90) from Béla Fleck and the Flecktones, whose Jingle All the Way won Best Pop Instrumental Album. Coffin is on tour with the Dave Matthews Band.