David Leaf
Adjunct Associate Professor - Music Industry and Musicology

Since 2010, David Leaf has been an adjunct professor at The UCLA Herb Alpert School of music where he teaches undergraduate courses in music documentary, songwriting and “The Reel Beatles.”

Off campus, Leaf is a Peabody Award-winning writer best known as a writer/producer/director of such acclaimed films as The Night James Brown Saved Boston, The U.S. vs. John Lennon, the Grammy-nominated feature Beautiful Dreamer: Brian Wilson and The Story of SMiLE, and The Bee Gees: This Is Where I Came In.  His most recent films as a director include To Tell The Truth, a documentary on Japanese Internment, and Born To Cry, the story of Rock and Roll Hall of Famer Dion Dimucci.

As an author, Leaf’s most recent book is 2022’s God Only Knows: The Story of Brian Wilson, the Beach Boys & the California Myth.

You can learn more about his distinguished body of work at www.leafprod.com

Professor David Leaf's Book Named One of Top 2023 Rock Books
Next to Bob Dylan’s Philosophy of Modern Sound and Bono’s memoir (yes, that Bono), one of the top rock books of 2023 is David Leaf’s God Only Knows: the Story
Top rock-era songwriters share life lessons of success, setbacks in popular UCLA class
Music and movies have been the main components of David Leaf’s 30-plus-year career as an award-winning filmmaker-biographer. His projects have opened up the lives of the greatest music makers of

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