Father Norman James O'Connor, (nicknamed "The Jazz Priest"), (November 20, 1921 in Detroit, Michigan – June 29, 2003) was an American priest in the Roman Catholic church who was known for playing and promoting jazz music. O'Connor became interested in jazz music at an early age and played piano with local jazz bands while in high school. He continued to work occasionally as a musician into the 1940s, but had abandoned the thought of music as a career by the time he enrolled at Catholic University in Washington. He wrote his doctoral thesis on the aesthetics of popular music.