As an ethnomusicologist, Paul Humphreys has conducted field work in China, Indonesia, Ghana, Japan, and the Pueblo Indian region of the Southwest United States. His published research addresses intercultural compositional practice, music and religion, and comparative music theory. From 1997 – 2020, he served as Director of World Music Ensembles at Loyola Marymount University (LMU), bringing students together with and featuring or commissioning new works from internationally-known artist-teachers from West Africa and Indonesia.
Live performances of Humphreys’ compositions have been featured during the 2008, 2005,and 2002 World Festivals of Sacred Music in Los Angeles, with invited screenings in years since at Boston University, the University of New Mexico, and in Wudang Shan, China. He has appeared as a solo pianist-composer in numerous recitals hosted by the LMU Department of Music, the Southern California Chapter of NACUSA (National Association of Composers, U.S.A.), Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, and Churchill College in Cambridge, England.
Previous to joining the LMU faculty, Humphreys’ teaching a[iliations have included UCLA, California Institute for the Arts, CSU (Northridge), and Kunitachi College of Music (Tokyo, Japan). As Emeritus Professor of Music (since 2022), he directs meetings of the Community Gamelan Workshop hosted by the Marymount Institute for Faith, Culture and the Arts at LMU. He currently serves as instructor for Ethnomusicology 10A, B (Music Theory and Musicianship, Intercultural Perspectives) in the Herb Alpert School of Music at UCLA.