Jonathon Grasse

Composer/ethnomusicologist Jonathon Grasse received his Ph.D. in music composition with the cognate in ethnomusicology from UCLA. His CDs and recordings appear on Centaur Records, CD Baby, and Bandcamp. His composition Triptych for string trio won the 2012 American Composers Forum - LA Chapter competition. His compositions have been performed throughout California, and in New York, Europe, China, and Mexico. He has received grants from the American Composers Forum and CSUDH College of Arts and Humanities

Professor Grasse’s current book project is Jazz Revolutionary: The Life and Music of Eric Dolphy, the first full biography of the multi-instrumental jazz virtuoso (Jawbone Press, forthcoming 2025). His two books on music from Minas Gerais, Brazil focus on regional identity, Afro-mineiro traditions, and the Clube da Esquina (Corner Club) popular music movement: Hearing Brazil: Music and Histories in Minas Gerais (University Press of Mississippi, 2022) and The Corner Club by Milton Nascimento and Lô Borges (Bloomsbury Academic, 2020). His chapter “Musical Space and Deep Regionalism in Minas Gerais, Brazil,” appears in Musical Spaces: Place, Performance, and Power (Jenny Stanford Publishing, 2022). His articles have appeared in the Yale Journal of Music and Religion (Fall, 2017), and Cambridge University’s Popular Music.  For much of this work Jonathon has received support from CSUDH RSCA grants, CSUDH sabbaticals, and College of the Arts and Humanities support.