Julia Keefe Indigenous Jazz Masterclass

brunette woman with yellow shirt against light gray background

Julia Keefe (image: Emily Jones)

Performer in a red dress singing into a vintage microphone on a brightly lit stage.

Julia Keefe performing with the Julia Keefe Indigenous Big Band (image: Chris Wooley)

March 5, 2026

Julia Keefe Indigenous Jazz Masterclass

Thursday, March 5, 2026 (tba)

4pm – 6pm (tba)

Morrison Hall

Masterclass limited to 20 attendees

Indigenous singer & band leader Julia Keefe will be an artist-in-residence during her Cal Performances' Illuminations concert visit with the Julie Keefe Indigenous Big Band from March 4 - 6, 2026, and is offering:

Indigenous Jazz Masterclass for students, in partnership with Myra Melford (Music Department) - application required
Artist Class Visits, in partnership with Beth Piatote (English/Comp Lit/DE in Native American Studies)
Lecture demonstration, in partnership with Marié Abe (Music Department)
Post-performance Artist Q&A, after her Fri March 6 event

The Indigenous Jazz Masterclass is open to UC Berkeley Undergraduate, Graduate, and Post-Doc students

Students will need to fill out a short application of interest. Applications will be reviewed by a panel and attendees announced Feb 1, 2026.

Presented as a collaboration between Cal Performance's Illuminations Series, the Arts Research Center, and the Department of Music

*MASTERCLASS APPLICATION OPENS NOVEMBER 15, 2025

The Illuminations series theme for 2025/26 is "Exile & Sanctuary." Exile is more than physical displacement—it is a rupture of identity, a stripping away of the familiar, leaving an individual or community without a sense of belonging. Sanctuary, in turn, can be both a refuge and a creative space where new connections are forged. This season’s Illuminations theme, “Exile & Sanctuary,” invites us to explore how people who have experienced exile have found comfort in building new identities and narratives, and how the arts can give voice to these important stories. Through performances and public programs, Illuminations events will consider how exile reshapes culture, how sanctuary helps imagine new communities, and how artistic expression offers a vital space for resistance, healing, and reinvention.

- Cal Performances Illuminations

The Arts Research Center is thrilled to collaborate with Cal Performances Illuminations and the Dept of Music in offering this free Indigenous Jazz Masterclass with singer & band leader JULIA KEEFE. Open to UC Berkeley Undergraduate, Graduate, and Post-Doc students. A truly one-of-a-kind ensemble, the Julia Keefe Indigenous Big Band celebrates and extends the contributions of Indigenous and Native musicians, composers, and bandleaders throughout the rich history of jazz. Indigenous artists like Russell “Big Chief” Moore, Mildred Bailey, Oscar Pettiford, and Jim Pepper ascended into the limelight as star performers, but many other players were never recognized. Today Keefe’s dynamic ensemble shines a light on that legacy, featuring a “who’s who” of Indigenous musicians from a range of tribal affiliations across North and South America. Julia Keefe Indigenous Big Band will debut as part of Cal Performances’ Illuminations: “Exile & Sanctuary” programming for the 2025–26 season. Illuminations connects groundbreaking UC Berkeley scholarship to themes taken up by the world-class music, dance, and theater presented by Cal Performances; their programming sheds light on pressing topics with the power to transform our understanding of the world and shape the future.

Julia Keefe (Nez Perce) is an internationally acclaimed Native American jazz vocalist, actor, activist, and educator currently based in New York City. Her professional career has spanned over 18 years and she has headlined marquee events at the Smithsonian Museum in Washington D.C., NMAI-NY, Kennedy Center, as well as opening for 20-time GRAMMY Award winner Tony Bennett and 4-time GRAMMY Award winner Esperanza Spalding. Julia’s recent recording, Nobody Else But Me, was released to glowing reviews. Her life’s work is the revival and honoring of the legendary Coeur d’Alene jazz musician Mildred Bailey and is leading the campaign for Bailey’s induction into the Jazz Hall of Fame at Lincoln Center. She currently directs the Julia Keefe Indigenous Big Band, highlighting the history and future of Indigenous people in jazz, which released their first studio recording spring 2024. She has performed with world-class musicians including Jim McNeely, John Beasley, Emmet Cohen, Billy Test, Dan Hearle, Andreas Oberg, Bob Bowman, Clipper Anderson, Jack Mouse, the Lionel Hampton Big Band, among many others.

Julia Keefe grew up in Kamiah, ID on her Tribe’s reservation before moving to Spokane, WA, where she began studying music and competing at the Lionel Hampton Jazz Festival each year, where she won Outstanding Vocal Soloist in the alto division. She earned her BA Music from the University of Miami’s Frost School of Music, taught jazz voice at Gonzaga University, and was a guest clinician at North Idaho College and Lionel Hampton Jazz Festival before relocating to NYC. She earned her master’s in music from Manhattan School of music in 2019, under the tutelage of Theo Bleckmann, Kate McGarry, Jo Lawry, Stefon Harris, Dave Liebman and Phil Markowitz. Julia also has a passion for Indigenous film and was a featured artist in Sterlin Harjo’s critically acclaimed documentary, Love and Fury. Her first feature film, Virginia Minnesota, was the closing feature at the 2018 Catalina Film Festival. Keefe is also the Executive Director of the Board for One Heart Native Arts and Film Festival, an annual non-profit festival in Spokane, showcasing the diversity and vitality of contemporary Native art in the Pacific Northwest and beyond.