Ray Gonzalez grew up in New Jersey and received his undergraduate degree from Princeton University, where he was initially exposed to the music industry in the early 1980s as an alternative rock disc jockey and eventually Station Manager of the student-run commercial radio station, WPRB-FM. Upon graduating from Princeton, Ray moved to California and enrolled at Stanford Law School, from where he graduated in 1987. Later that year Ray was admitted to the California Bar and became an associate at the Los Angeles law firm of Buchalter, Nemer, Fields & Younger, beginning his practice in the corporate transactional field.

For 16 years beginning in 1990, Ray worked in the Business & Legal Affairs department of Warner Bros. Records in Burbank, where he was a Vice President from 1998 to 2006. During his long tenure at Warner Bros., Ray experienced first-hand how the major labels began the long, difficult transition from the established disc and tape-based distribution model to the new “content-based” distribution model that is now emerging over multiple digital platforms. Ray’s department was responsible for adapting the label’s exclusive artist deals to the current business model as well as making and reviewing a multitude of unique third party deals addressing opportunities for the label that have arisen in the new digital era.

Ray served for three years as co-instructor for the popular UCLA Extension class “Understanding Contracts Of The Music Business”, which was geared to explain typical music business concepts and the evolution of the business not only to lawyers and managers, but to artists and entrepreneurs as well.

As a member of the law firm of Zumwalt, Almon & Hayes, PLLC, Ray will be able to apply his vast business affairs expertise to a diverse array of individual and institutional entertainment industry clients.