Professor Bruce Conforth, Ph.D.

Bruce Conforth teaches folklore, blues music, popular culture, and the history of social movements at the University of Michigan.  Dr. Conforth was the founding curator of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum.  He serves on the Executive Board of the Robert Johnson Blues Foundation and is a Director of the Blues Heritage Foundation.  He is also a performing blues musician.

Bruce has received numerous grants to support his research including funding from the National Science Foundation, the American Association of State and Local History and the Henry Luce Foundation.  His compilation of African American recordings from the American South (Cap’n You’re So Mean – Rounder Records) was named one of the best folk music recordings of the year by the Library of Congress

In 2012, Professor Conforth became the recipient of the University of Michigan’s Golden Apple Award as Most Outstanding Professor and was named as one of America’s 300 Best Professors by the Princeton Review.  He has been published in leading academic and popular journals including Western Folklore, The Journal of Folklore Research, The Journal of the Society for Ethnomusicology, The Journal of American Folklore, Living Blues, Masters of Rock, and many others. He has been a guest on National Public Radio, ABC television’s Good Morning America, as well as radio and television shows around the world.In May 2013 Conforth’s book African American Folksong and American Cultural Politics: The Lawrence Gellert Story was published by Rowman and Littlefield. It has been cited as one of the 100 most important books on American music.