{"id":197492,"date":"2026-03-10T01:06:20","date_gmt":"2026-03-10T01:06:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/197492\/"},"modified":"2026-03-10T01:06:20","modified_gmt":"2026-03-10T01:06:20","slug":"legendary-texas-musician-who-co-founded-two-famous-tex-mex-bands-has-passed-away-at-age-85","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/197492\/","title":{"rendered":"Legendary Texas Musician Who Co-Founded Two Famous Tex-Mex Bands Has Passed Away at Age 85"},"content":{"rendered":"

Texas music legend Augie Meyers<\/a>, founding keyboardist of the popular Tex-Mex bands Sir Douglas Quintet<\/a> and the Texas Tornados<\/a>, has died at age 85. Meyers passing was announced on his official Facebook page<\/a>.<\/p>\n

According to the message, he \u201cpassed away peacefully in his sleep on Saturday, March 7th \u2026 with his wife Sara at his side.\u201d<\/p>\n

[RELATED: Tejano Music Trailblazer, Flaco Jim\u00e9nez, Dead at 86\u2014Grammy Winner Collaborated With Bob Dylan & The Rolling Stones]<\/a><\/p>\n

The note added, \u201cA memorial service for the public will be announced soon. The family thanks all of Augie\u2019s friends and fans for their prayers during this time.\u201d<\/p>\n

The San Antonio-born Meyers began playing with his childhood friend and longtime collaborator Doug Sahm in the 1950s. In the early 1960s, they co-founded the Sir Douglas Quintet. Fronted by Sahm, the band featured Meyers\u2019 Vox organ is a key element of its sound.<\/p>\n

The Sir Douglas Quintet scored its biggest hit in 1965 with the Sahm-penned garage-rock classic \u201cShe\u2019s About A Mover.\u201d The song peaked at No. 13 on the Billboard Hot 100. The band also had Top-40 hits with \u201cThe Rains Came\u201d in 1966 and \u201cMendocino\u201d in 1968.<\/p>\n

After the group broke up in 1972, Meyers and Sahm continued throughout the 1970s.<\/p>\n

In 1989, Meyers and Sahm formed the Tex-Mex supergroup Texas Tornados with country and Tejano singer Freddy Fender and conjunto accordion legend Flaco Jim\u00e9nez.<\/p>\n

The band\u2019s self-titled debut album was released in both English and Spanish versions in 1990. The Texas Tornados song \u201c(Hey Baby) Que Paso,\u201d which Meyers co-wrote, is known as the national anthem of San Antonio. In 1991, the group won a Grammy in the Best Mexican-American Performance category for the song \u201cSoy de San Luis.\u201d<\/p>\n

Meyers\u2019 Session Work, Later Career, and More<\/p>\n

Meyers also lent his signature keyboard sound to recordings by many famous artists. Among them were Bob Dylan, Willie Nelson, Tom Waits, Jerry Lee Lewis, Townes Van Zandt, Raul Malo, and Tom Jones.<\/p>\n

He was featured prominently on two Dylan albums, 1997\u2019s Time Out Of Mind and 2001\u2019s Love And Theft. Both won Grammy Awards for Best Contemporary Folk Album, while Time Out Of Mind also won the Album of the Year prize.<\/p>\n

Meyers also released many solo albums throughout his career. He continued playing in The Texas Tornados with various other musicians, including Sahm\u2019s son, Shawn.<\/p>\n

Augie released his final solo album, Chicken Fried Bacon Grease, in 2024.<\/p>\n

Meyers was the last surviving original member of the Texas Tornados. Doug Sahm died of a heart attack in 1999 at age 58. Fender died of cancer in 2006 at age 69. Jim\u00e9nez passed away in July 2025 at the age of 86.<\/p>\n

In an obit posted in the San Antonio Express-News,<\/a> Texas Tornado drummer Ernie Durawa shared a reflection on Meyers\u2019 personality and musical talent.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s one of a kind,\u201d Durawa said. \u201cHe was always full of jokes and just a fun guy to play with.\u201d He added, \u201cAugie had his own style of playing those triplets, the way he attacked those chords.\u201d<\/p>\n

(Photo by Ebet Roberts\/Redferns)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Texas music legend Augie Meyers, founding keyboardist of the popular Tex-Mex bands Sir Douglas Quintet and the Texas…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":197493,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[78077,27,29,28],"class_list":["post-197492","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-texas","tag-classic-rock","tag-texas","tag-texas-headlines","tag-texas-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/197492","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=197492"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/197492\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/197493"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=197492"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=197492"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=197492"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}