Dr. J. Emanuel Dufrasne González

Dr. J. Emanuel Dufrasne González, a consultant for SanArte Cultura and facilitator who will represent the Southern Region at the Roundtable, is an ethnomusicologist, trombonist, composer, and educator born in Ponce in 1955. Founder and director of Paracumbé since 1979, he has dedicated his career to the preservation and dissemination of bomba and plena as essential Afro-Puerto Rican expressions. With a BA in Music Education (UPR) and an MA/Ph.D. in Ethnomusicology (UCLA), he has been a professor at the UPR since 1988, where he has researched and taught about Afro-Caribbean musical traditions. He has given concerts and workshops in the Americas, the Caribbean, and Europe, in addition to publishing albums and books such as Puerto Rico also has... tambó! and Puerto Rico and its plena . His academic, artistic, and community work consolidates him as a key figure in the revaluation of African musical roots in Puerto Rico.