A musicologist specializing in the history and analysis of music and visual media, Neil Lerner has research interests in music in U.S. film & media, cultural history, and disability studies. At Davidson since 1997, he has also taught at Duke University, Centre College, and with the Kentucky Governor’s Scholars Program. Trained as a pianist, bassoonist, and harpsichordist, Lerner is learning how to play the theremin, and he sometimes composes incidental music and creates sound design for theater projects. Currently secretary of the Society for American Music, he has also served on the National Council of the American Musicological Society and as president of the American Musicological Society-Southeast chapter.

Regional, national, and international presentations, including papers for the American Musicological Society, the Society for American Music, the Society for Cinema and Media Studies, the Royal Music Association, Domitor, Orphans, Visible Evidence, the Society for Disability Studies, and the Slayage Conference on Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

After studying music in documentary films in his dissertation, Lerner has gone on to write about music in a variety of cinematic genres (Westerns, science fiction, horror) with recent work in music for television, animation, and video games. His current research considers questions of musical style in early video games. In addition to serving on the editorial board of the journal Music, Sound, and the Moving Image, and editing the book series "Music and Screen Media" with Routledge, Lerner also serves as editor of American Music. Right now Lerner is co-editing two new books: Music in Video Games (Routledge) and The Oxford Handbook of Music and Disability Studies.

He is the faculty advisor for Davidson College's chapter of Hillel.