OUR HISTORY

School owner Amy Boyd moved from her sweltering hometown of Houston to Austin in 1991 to attend the University of Texas at Austin for vocal performance, buying her first home in Cedar Park in 1998. After college, she left music for a few years to work as Directory of Online Community Relations for Origin Systems (an Electronic Arts studio) before returning to music a few years later, armed with a resume full of marketing and business experience. It was the perfect recipe for accidentally creating a music school.

In 2008, our first guitar, bass, and voice students took lessons in a spare bedroom in Cedar Park while cats made themselves comfy in guitar cases and parents hung out in the living room. The school was initially called "Guitar Austin" - which in retrospect wasn't a great name since a) we taught more than guitar, and b) we weren't actually in Austin. At the time, we were also working with several local jambands, so the school was renamed Sense & Color School of Music, after a lyric from the Grateful Dead song Terrapin Station*.

Over the next few years, word-of-mouth grew, and finally in June 2012 - narrowly avoiding the wrath of the HOA - we moved into our first commercial location on Brushy Creek, in the heart of Cedar Park. It had a lovely view of the dumpster, but it was home!

When COVID hit in 2020, we kept the music going through Zoom lessons, and rather than continue to pay rent on an unused building, we left our Cedar Park location. In 2021, as the world emerged from their homes, we found and purchased our beautiful new forever home in the Parkside Commons complex on S. Bagdad Rd in Leander, TX, next to Robin Bledsoe Park—just a few minutes from Cedar Park and Leander High School in one direction, and Liberty Hill in the other. Goodbye city life, hello hill country!

The name Sense & Color was cool in a jamband environment, but it wasn't the most memorable for a music school in the 'burbs. After *years* of deliberation, the perfect forever name finally presented itself in January 2026! Vivid is short, memorable, and easy to spell, and it captures everything we strive for: bold, bright, eager, and artistic. Just like our students!

So as of February 2026, Vivid School of Music was born. Same owner, same location, same everything - just a different name and infinitely cooler logo. So long Sense & Color, and thanks for all the fish!

At Vivid Music School, we don’t just want students to play music, but to love music. We're professional working and gigging musicians who are constantly pushing our own musical horizons, working to find the right balance of discipline, fun, and musical inspiration.

And we don't just teach. We're also here to listen, encourage, and be an ally for students that need one. We want our students to express themselves artistically, and to help them become comfortable performing for themselves and with others.

We may be just a little local place, but we've been featured twice as the Community Impact newspaper Cedar Park Business of the Month, and we're an active member of the Leander Chamber of Commerce. We’ve also sponsored the Vista Ridge HS Theater Program, the Leander HS Theater Program, and the Henry MS Band, as well as numerous LISD school festivals and community events.

Vivid teachers have made waves too, moving on to play packed stadiums, international festivals, and share stages with names like Andrew W. K, Lady Gaga, Dan Auerbach,  John Popper, and Willie Nelson.