Daniel Castro PantojaAssistant Professor of Musicology

• PhDUniversity of California, Riverside2018
• MMThe University of Akron2013
• BMLoyola University New Orleans2011

Daniel Castro Pantoja's research explores how political agents mobilize popular and Western art musics in twentieth- and twenty-first-century Latin American state politics. He is particularly interested in the exchange, transformation, and accumulation of political and symbolic capital produced through various types of musicking, especially those mediated through partisan, nationalist, and populist politics in Colombia (e.g., listening to opera, singing in workers' choirs, and expressing collective shame and self-deprecating humor through rally chants and protest songs). His work draws on post-foundational political theory, Latin American cultural studies, decolonial theory, and global music history.

Daniel is currently working on a book project titled, "Music Intimacies and Partisan Culture during Colombia’s Populist Era,” a musicological study of populism in the culture of Colombian partisan politics during the first half of the twentieth century. He is also co-editor of the Oxford Handbook of Global Music History (under contract with Oxford University Press). His research has been published in journals such as the Journal of the American Musicological Society, the Journal of Musicology, Latin American Research Review, the Journal of Music History Pedagogy, among others. His public-facing work has appeared in the Smithsonian Folkways Blog, the UC Press Blog, the Red Cultural del Banco de la República de Colombia, and BBC Radio 3.

Daniel's doctoral dissertation, “Antagonism, Europhilia, and Identity: Guillermo Uribe Holguín and the Politics of National Music in Early Twentieth Century Colombia," was distinguished with the Wiley Housewright Dissertation Award (2020) of the Society for American Music for the best dissertation in the field of American music studies. He is the first Latino to receive this prize. Daniel is also a Smithsonian Latino Museum Studies Program alumni (2015). He has curated exhibitions such as Jacqueline Nova: Creación de la Tierra, an immersive sound-based installation based on Colombian lesbian composer Jacqueline Nova's Creación de la Tierra (Blaffer Art Museum, 2019–2020, curated with Tyler Blackwell) and Coleccionistas de sonidos: El álbum musical de Ana y Cristina Echeverría (2021, curated with Juana Monsalve, Juan Fernando Velásquez, and Rondy Torres), a digital exhibition funded by the Bogotá Philharmonic Orchestra and the city of Bogotá’s Program of Cultural Incentives. Daniel often integrates museum experiences into his courses.

Daniel serves as Area Editor for Northern South America for the Grove Music Online Ibero-Latin update project (Oxford Music Online). He is co-chair of the American Musicological Society's Global Music History Study Group (2020–present) and is a member of the Academic Council of the Patronato Colombiano de Artes y Ciencias (2020–present). He was a council member of the American Musicological Society (2020–2023) and was Associate Editor of Ethnomusicology Review (2015–2016).

Daniel joined the music faculty at Emory University in 2024, having previously taught at the University of North Carolina-Greensboro, the University of Houston, and the Pontificia Universidad Javeriana (Bogotá, Colombia). From 2020 to 2022, he was a Research Associate at the Center for Iberian and Latin American Music at UC Riverside. He holds a Ph.D. in musicology from the University of California Riverside, an M.M. in classical guitar performance from the University of Akron (studied under Stephen Aron), and a B.M. in music performance from Loyola University New Orleans (summa cum laude; minor in music industry studies).

Book Manuscripts in Preparation

• The Oxford Handbook of Global Music History, co-edited with Olivia Bloechl, Hedy Law, Jessica Bissett Perea, and Juliana M. Pistorius (under contract with Oxford University Press).
• Music Intimacies and Partisan Politics during Colombia’s Populist Era (in progress).

Recent Peer-Reviewed Articles and Book Chapters                                 

• “El Bambuco se Escribe con B de Beethoven: hacia una poética social del absurdo en la música nacional” in El sonido que seremos: un rompecabezas imposible de historias y prácticas musicales en Colombia, Sergio Ospina Romero y Rondy F. Torres, eds., (Ediciones Unidandes, forthcoming).
• “Grasping the Global, Historicizing Negativity” in “Colloquy: Theorizing Global Music History.” Journal of the American Musicological Society 76, no. 3 (December 1, 2023): 831–72. Convened by Olivia Bloechl and Hyun Kyong Hannah Chang.
• “Introduction by the Guest Editors: Global Music History in the Classroom: Reflections on Concepts and Practice,” Journal of Music History Pedagogy 13, No 1 (2023): 45-51. Co-authored with Hyun Kyong Hannah Chang and Hedy Law.
• “Listening for Intimacy: Scale, (Dis)Comfort, and Global Music History” in “Forum—Centering Discomfort in Global Music History.” Journal of Musicology 40, no. 3 (July 1, 2023): 249–307. Convened by Hedy Law.
• “Life of a Colombian Musician: Music Autobiography, Cosmopolitan Musickings, and Agonistic Objectification,” Journal of the American Musicological Society 75, no. 3 (December 1, 2022): 439–85.
• “Two Anthems and a Joke: Sounding the Colombian Uprising, 2019–2021,” Americas: A Hemispheric Music Journal 30 (2021): 58–93. Co-authored with Beatriz Goubert and Juan Fernando Velasquez Ospina.

Edited Volumes

• Special Issue on “Teaching Global Music History.” Journal of the Music History Pedagogy 13, no. 1 (2023). Guest-edited with Hyun Kyong Hannah Chang and Hedy Law.

Reviews and Other Publications

• “Centering Discomfort in Global Music History.” UC Press Blog (blog), August 15, 2023. https://www.ucpress.edu/blog/63035/centering-discomfort-in-global-music-history/. Co-authored with Olivia A. Bloechl.
• “Tania León's Stride: A Polyrhythmic Life by Alejandro L. Madrid (Review)’’ Journal of the International Alliance for Women in Music 29, no. 1 (2023): 17-18.
• “The Invention of Latin American Music: A Transnational History by Pablo Palomino (Review),” Latin American Music Review 43, no. 1 (2022): 113–16.
• “Hemispherically Organized Sound: Knowing Politics through Music or Music through Politics in the Americas.” Latin American Research Review 52, no. 1 (2017): 164-172. Review essay; co-authored with Jacob Rekedal.
• “Jacqueline Nova: Creación de la Tierra,” Catalog Text (English and Spanish), Blaffer Art Museum (2020): http://blafferartmuseum.org/jacqueline-nova/

• Coleccionistas de Sonidos. Siglo XIX: El álbum Musical de Ana y Cristina Echeverría, digital exhibition (curated with Juana Monsalve, Juan Fernando Velásquez, and Rondy Torres).
  • Read José Manuel Izquierdo König's review of this exhibition in the Journal of the Society of American Music here.

• Jacqueline Nova: Creación de la Tierra, sound installation. Blaffer Art Museum in Houston, TX, October 19, 2019—January 4, 2020). Curated with Tyler Blackwell.
  • Read about Jacqueline Nova and this exhibition in the New York Times here.