Jay Som
American singer-songwriter (born 1994)
Melina Mae Cortez Duterte (born 1994), better known by her stage name Jay Som, is an American singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, producer and mixing engineer. Pursuing an indie rock sound, she released her debut studio album Turn Into in mid-2016, followed by Everybody Works in 2017, Anak Ko in 2019, and Belong in 2025.
Born in Walnut Creek, California, Duterte spent her childhood in Pleasanton and Brentwood. She grew up playing the trumpet and guitar, and began writing and recording music at the age of 12. She originally intended to attend a conservatory program for jazz but instead decided to focus on songwriting. Jay Som has toured with Boygenius and released music with Palehound's Ellen Kempner under the band name Bachelor.
Early life
Melina Mae Cortez Duterte was born in 1994 in Walnut Creek, California, to Filipino immigrant parents, and was raised in Pleasanton and Brentwood. She often cites her parents' immigrant background and cultural customs as major influences. She came out as queer when she was around 12 years old.
Duterte grew up playing the trumpet and guitar, and began writing and recording music at the age of 12.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Jay Som” as american singer-songwriter (born 1994). Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
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Chronology provides the most reliable spine for this subject; interpretation should follow only after identities and dates are secure. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 10, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q28450815. VIAF identifies the subject as 595149196596074791731. The Library of Congress control number is no2017037091. None of the 4 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1994, 2016, 2017 and 2019.
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This entry incorporates text from “Jay Som” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.