James W. McKinnon (1932 - February 23, 1999) was an American musicologist most known for his work in the fields of Western plainchant, medieval and renaissance music, Latin liturgy and musical iconography. He was the author of five books, including Source Readings in Music History, Music in Early Christian Literature, and The Advent Project: The Later Seventh-Century Creation of the Roman Mass Proper, which attempts to reconstruct the history of plainchant from New Testament times to the Carolingian period. He also edited the collection The Music of Antiquity and the Middle Ages which includes chapters he wrote on early Western civilization, Christian antiquity and the emergence of Gregorian chant. McKinnon published more than one hundred articles in music journals and reference books. McKinnon was a professor of music at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the chair of the music department at the University at Buffalo.
