RIP: Dan Storper, CEO, Musicologist, and JFK Researcher

Founder of Putumayo World Music interviewed widely about the assassinations of the 1960s.

JFK researcher and musicologist Dan Storper, featuring the cover of one of the many albums from his Putumayo label (Credit: Mark Olivier/Billboard)

Dan Storper, a globetrotting entrepreneur of music and dedicated JFK assassination researcher, has died at 74 years of age. Best known for founding Putumayo World Music which introduced the music of Latin America, the Caribbean, Africa, the Middle East and South Asia to millions of listeners, Storper also played a leading role in the Truth and Reconciliation Committee, which in 2020 called for re-opening investigation of the four political assassinations in the 1960s.

I knew Putumayo’s music long before I knew Dan. With expertly curated playlists of extraordinary sounds from around the world, the colorful Putumayo albums enlightened me and countless others about the incredible variety of song, voice, melody and rhythm that is world music. When I met him I asked how he organized the finding and sifting of all that music. I figured he must have a global network. He told me it was mostly just him and a friend, and I was amazed. Dan, I realized, was a world-class musicologist.

As Dan shared with his passion for understanding JFK’s assassination, I understood his business success. He was a world-class listener. As he travelled from city to city by car to meet with Putumayo retailers, he also interviewed people who had knowledge of the events leading to the assassinations of John F. Kennedy, Robert Kennedy, Martin Luther King, and Malcolm X. When we went to see an old soldier of fortune in Miami, we listened to a war stories and tall tales with Dan only occasionally interjecting a precise factual question to establish relationships with other underworld characters of the early 1960s.

It was relationships that Dan cared about. I could tell he took pleasure in re-connecting with the fellow entrepreneurs who had stuck with Putumayo in the disruptive transition from the now-vanished world of CDs to the current reality of downloads and streaming. And he took pleasure in helping JFK researchers connect with unknown people whom he thought were important in the JFK story. His stories and insights for the JFK Facts podcast were always interesting and on point.

Dan introduced me to the best music and food in New Orleans, but he was no sybarite. His car, it must be said was a disaster area. The passenger seat inevitably had to be clearcut for occupancy. The back seat was a wasteland of scattered papers, Putumayo albums, paper cups, ancient JFK books, credit card receipts, newspapers, an old briefcase, even a pair of shoes. It was his chariot. What mattered to him, was not appearances but the road ahead, and now he’s departed one last time.

Farewell Dan.

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