Dr. Samuel Lamontagne is a writer, scholar, and professor at the University of California, Riverside. His work explores Black music as a form of knowledge production and a central site of Black intellectual, cultural, and political life. Grounded in sustained engagement with musicians, archives, and community-based cultural institutions, his research and collaborative projects center histories of freedom, resistance, and imagination in the African diaspora.

His recent projects include Leave It for the Children (Angel City Press, 2026), co-edited with Darol Olu Kae, which explores the sixty-five years of the Pan Afrikan Peoples Arkestra, the community-based ensemble founded in Los Angeles by Horace Tapscott. He is also co-director, with H. Samy Alim and Tabia Shawel, of In the Hour of Chaos, a documentary covering Chuck D’s teaching at UCLA, developed alongside a companion volume published by the University of California Press (2026). Together, they co-established the UCLA Hip Hop Initiative, a platform for research, pedagogy, and public programming.

Beyond the university, his work extends into radio, archival production, and music communities. He is a radio producer and DJ with DUBLAB and has been involved in independent music networks in Los Angeles and beyond through collaborations with Preferences Records and The Village Records. His projects include co-producing the reissue of Wala Wala Bok? (1996), the debut album of the pioneering Senegalese hip hop group Pee Froiss, and the Pan Afrikan Peoples Arkestra’s 60-Years compilation.

His work has been featured in outlets including the Los Angeles Times and NPR’s The World, as well as international media such as RFI and EFE. His research and projects have been presented at institutions including the Hammer Museum, the California African American Museum, the Grammy Museum, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions (LACE), and the Musée national des arts asiatiques – Guimet in Paris.


contact: slamonta@ucr.edu



Pic by Pia Davis