Fernando Jones

Music educator Fernando Jones was born on February 7, 1964 in the Bronzeville neighborhood of Chicago, Illinois to Essie and Willie Jones. Inspired by his older brother, multi-instrumentalist Greg Jones, he began learning to play guitar in 1968 and received his first instrument from his uncle two years later. Jones earned his B.A. degree in architecture and art from the University of Illinois at Chicago in 1987.

While a student, Jones organized the university’s first blues festival in 1985. He later performed as a musician and actor in theater productions, including The Lifting, directed by Ron O.J. Parson at ETA Creative Arts Foundation in 1988. In 1989, he published I Was There When the Blues Was Red Hot, with a foreword by Sterling D. Plumpp. Jones launched the Blues Kids of America program in 1990 and, in 2005, became the founding director of the Blues Ensemble Program at Columbia College Chicago. In 2010, Jones Blues Camp International, to teach youth musicians ages twelve through eighteen blues music. As a performer with his band, Fernando Jones & My Band!, he appeared internationally and at major venues such as the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, Ohio and the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C.

Jones participated in conferences hosted by the National Association of Music Merchants, the National Alliance of Black School Educators, the Association for Popular Music Education, and Delta State University’s Blues Conference.

He joined the Chicago Federation of Musicians in 1993 and became a life member of Kappa Alpha Psi Fraternity in 2016. Jones was inducted into the Chicago Blues Hall of Fame as a Master Blues Artist & Educator in 2014, and received the Keep the Blues Alive Education Award in 2008 and the Torch for Fine Arts Award from Sigma Gamma Rho Sorority, Inc., in 2015.

Jones lives in Chicago, Illinois.

Fernando Jones was interviewed by The HistoryMakers on April 6, 2023 and on November 6, 2024.