He received his doctorate in Critical & Comparative Studies of Music in 2014 from The University of Virginia. His dissertation, “How to Make Music in an Epidemic: Hearing AIDS, 1981-1996,” explores the representation of HIV/AIDS in popular song and the musical activism that flourished in response to the epidemic. His work appears in The Journal of Popular Music Studies and The Journal of the Society for American Music with forthcoming essays on affect, activism, and AIDS and “crip virtuosity” and Joni Mitchell’s guitar style which will appear in 2017. He is currently at work on a monograph about the life, legacy, and music of Michael Callen.