On November 9, 2025, it was announced that Jonathan W. Whitney would serve as SsAM’s Interim Director of Music and Community Engagement beginning December 1. Click here to read Father Patrick’s announcement.
Jazz musician explores Black history of Delaware Revolutionary War site.
Musician Jonathan Whitney has composed a jazz suite about Black history at Cooch’s Bridge, the site of Delaware’s only Revolutionary War battle. Whitney believes celebrating and humanizing enslaved people whose stories have not been extensively documented is more important than ever when the federal government is making advances to whitewash the history of American slavery. Click here to learn more. Posted October 6, 2026.
About Jonathan
(November, 2025)
Jonathan W. Whitney is a father, husband, son, artivist, jazz drummer, and composer. He uses his music to search for spaces to find understanding.
Commissions include Lilly (2025), Cooch’s Bridge: The Battle (2025) Cooch’s Bridge The African American Presence (2024), Cooch’s Bridge | The Family (2023), collaborations with the choreographer Ashley S.K. Davis to craft music for her dance works Divided We Fall (2019) and Ode (owed) to Black Women (2022), When The Two Shall Meet (2019), Bedtime (2019), for institutions such as Melomanie, Pieces of a Dream, Inc (dance company), the Friends of the Cooch’s Bridge Historic Site, and the Sothern Vermont Arts Center.
He has been a featured artist with the Wilmington Children’s Chorus, University of Delaware Orchestra, and Melomanie, to name a few. Artists he has performed with include Vernon James, Donald Byrd, Kevin Kirkwood, Lili Añel, Jea Street, Jr., Mike Boone, John Swana, Nadjah Nicole, V. Shayne Fredrick, Maya Belardo, The Chantelles, Tony Smith, and The Bearded Ladies.
His debut album, Life’s Dimensions (2020), can be found on all platforms. He was a recipient of the 2020 Delaware Established Artist Fellowship for jazz composition. Jonathan is currently the artist-in-residence at the Episcopal Church of Saints Andrew and Matthew. He has his undergraduate degree in Music Education from the University of Delaware and a Masters in Music in Jazz Studies from the University of the Arts. Jonathan grew up in Newark, Delaware, and his father – a former professional drummer with an organ repair business – was his earliest musical influence.
Whitney began his musical life by spending hours creating songs on his family’s organ and playing drumset along with reel-to-reel recordings of his father’s top-40 band. He took piano lessons from age nine through eleven, his only private lessons before beginning formal music studies as an undergraduate. There, his mentor Vernon James exposed him to the essence of being a jazz artist, including the importance of composing. Upon graduating, Jonathan became active in the Philadelphia music scene. This period was filled with creative explorations into many genres of music. He then returned to academia, receiving a master’s degree in Jazz Studies, during which he focused on composition, drumset, and hand percussion. Now, his music merges jazz idioms with classical forms; the written music acts as a skeleton, allowing the full character to be revealed in performance. His compositions are crafted around melody, pushed by harmony, prodded by counter melody, but led by texture.
Whether he is writing a new commission for a string ensemble or collaborating with a choreographer on a new dance suite or performing with his ensemble The Whitney Project or supporting another artist’s work, Jonathan looks for spaces to create moments of connection between the music and the audience.
Photo by Joe del Tufo, Moonloop Photography
