Bio
Jonathan A. Gómez is a musicologist studying Black American musics of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, particularly popular musics. His work is situated at the intersection of music studies and Black studies.
Gómez is currently at work on a book project tentatively titled “The Way We Play: Hearing Black American History and Musical Identity” (under contract with University of Chicago Press), in which he explores how Black Americans hear and represent themselves in musical sound. He also has work forthcoming in the Journal of the American Musicological Society.
He is an active jazz saxophonist, and has studied jazz and improvisation with Gary Keller, Mark Small, Phil Doyle, Rich Perry, Hal Crook, and George Garzone. He can be heard on pianist Roberto Magris’s 2017 album Live in Miami @ the WDNA Jazz Gallery, as well as on several tracks of Geo Trio’s 2019 album We Made an Album!
Gómez earned a Ph.D. in Music with a secondary field in African and African American Studies from Harvard University in November of 2022, an M.A. in Musicology from Michigan State University in 2018, and a B.M. in Studio Music and Jazz from the University of Miami’s Frost School of Music in 2016. Before joining the faculty at the University of Michigan, Gómez taught in the University of Southern California’s Thornton School of Music.
