Lewis Robert Porter (born May 14, 1951) is an American jazz pianist, composer, author, and educator. Education and career Porter was born in Scranton, Pennsylvania, but raised primarily in the Bronx in New York City. Porter decided at age 10 that he wanted to be a musician, and took violin lessons from about age 10 to 12, then taught himself at the family's upright piano, eventually taking some lessons in college and afterward. Porter earned a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology from the University of Rochester in 1972, and, while there, studied music at Eastman. He went on to earn a Master of Education in Counseling from Northeastern University in 1976, followed by a master's degree in Music Theory from Tufts University in 1979, under T. J. Anderson, his primary mentor. In 1983, Porter received his Ph.D. in Musicology from Brandeis University, where he studied under Joshua Rifkin. He first taught at Tufts University, jazz history, part-time, starting in January 1977. (This led to his being mentored by Anderson.) In 1982 he became a full-time tenure track music professor at Tufts, and he also taught part-time at Brandeis from 1979 through about 1984. In 1986, he became a Professor of Music at Rutgers University, where in September 1997 he founded the world's first jazz history program, the Master's Program in Jazz History and Research, which he directed until his retirement from Rutgers in January 2018. During the Rutgers years, he also taught at The New School, Manhattan School of Music, NYU, William Paterson University, and Jazz at Lincoln Center. Porter has performed as a jazz pianist since his college days, and worked during his Boston years (1974–86) with Alan Dawson, Herb Pomeroy, George Garzone and others. (He also played alto saxophone during those years, but gave it up around 1994 due to lack of time to practice it in addition to the piano.) His current career is primarily as a performer on piano and synthesizer, with many artists, across the USA and Europe. His 2018 album Beauty & Mystery featured Terri Lyne Carrington, John Patitucci and Tia Fuller. He has appeared with them in concert, and has also played with Dave Liebman, Jerry Bergonzi, Bela Fleck, Don Byron, Dave King, two pianos with Vijay Iyer, two pianos with Ethan Iverson, and many others. He has appeared on about 30 albums (as of August 2019) as a sideperson, co-leader, or as