"Julia Joseph is one of the finest performers of song out there today. She lets you know in every note that soul, swing, heart and intelligence can never go out of style.

Julia conveys a vast range of emotion with her voice, not only in her own very strong material but also in the many songs from many different genre that she works into her repertoire. Though Julia has very strongly formed roots in classic soul, jazz, latin and rhythm and blues, her music is timeless. It allows you to leave your contemporary moment and float in it's world. In Julia's world, dreams come alive and the human heart speaks clearly for all.

I love the way Julia performs a song. She closes her eyes and lets the feeling pour out from her heart into each note. She savors each word that she delivers. She dances to every beat. There's a fearlessness about Julia that's totally inspirational. She lets herself really feel the joy, the heartache and the perplexity of every moment she lives in song.

She's not afraid to open up and laugh with her whole gut between songs either. "

-Milton

Julia's debut album, Hush, won the 2008 Independent Music Award's popular vote for Best Folk/Singer-Songwriter Album; a debut complimented by her inspired and well-honed live act.

Julia also does freelance work as a session vocalist and back-up singer. Her voice can occassionally be heard on the NBC hit comedy 30 Rock and she is a regular support player for singer-songwriter Milton.

(For more info on Julia's session and collaborative work, please visit the VOXBOX.)

FAQ

WHERE DID JULIA GROW UP?
Julia grew up primarily in the East Bay of Northern California and San Francisco. She had brief stints as a child in Southern California and Paris, France and spent one of her college years abroad in Florence, Italy. Julia moved to New York City at the age of 17 and that has been her primary home base ever since.

DID JULIA STUDY MUSIC?
Julia studied voice throughout her college career at Sarah Lawrence. Her lessons were mostly classical until after college. She has also studied some music history, theory, musical improvisation, guitar and drums. She is currently learning drums and percussion, and considers herself long overdue for another guitar lesson.

DID JULIA ALWAYS WANT TO BE A MUSICIAN?
As a matter of fact, no! Julia always wanted to sing, act and perform in some capacity, but never had any designs on being a musician, let alone a songwriter. She still feels like she writes and leads her band almost in spite of herself. Julia started studying music on a whim. She fell in love with the music building at Sarah Lawrence when she went to meet the voice teachers and enrolled in a full music curriculum. She took up guitar because of a high end Martin that fell into her possession. Julia felt that the instrument needed to be played and so took it upon herself to learn. It was playing guitar that led Julia to writing songs. In the beginning, understanding music theory was actually quite difficult for Julia; an experience she equates with her first encounters with Algebra. During all three years of her time studying music at Sarah Lawrence, she felt like no more than a voyeur into the world of musicians. Eventually, however, a light bulb went on and she's been grooving with it ever since. Building a musical vocabulary has helped Julia to see that she is, in fact, not only a musician to the core of her soul, but also in possession of a very natural musicality.

WHO ARE JULIA'S BIGGEST MUSICAL INFLUENCES?
Julia listens to so much music and it's all over the place stylistically. However there are a few artists and albums that seeped into her musical lanscape at a very young age (or hit her like a freight train in later on down the line). Among them are  Rickie Lee Jones' debut album, the music of John Fahey, Phoebe Snow's "Second Childhood", Van Morrisson's "Astral Weeks", Joan Armatrading's "Show Some Emotion", Nick Drake's "Pink Moon", Joni Mitchell, B.B. King, R.L. Burnside, Mississippi John Hurt, Leadbelly and Nina Simone. Of course there is way more, but this stuff is really the fiber of Julia's soul.
Recent obesssions: First Edition and Roberta Flack.

DOES JULIA COME FROM A MUSICAL FAMILY?
Yes and No. Julia's father had a guitar but didn't play much throughout her childhood. Her father is and was a photographer, her mother was a make-up artist and is now a model, and her brother is a fine artist. Julia's brother has a natural musicality and was always a gifted performer, but visual art was his true passion. There wasn't a lot of music going on in Julia's home until her adolescent and teenage years. Then she was turned on to an incredibly eclectic array of music; Tom Waits, Jimmy Cliff, The Stones, The Velvet Underground, Philip Glass, Opera, Classical, Throat Singing, Yodeling, Ray Charles, Betty Carter, Sonny Rollins, Max Roach, etc. Since becoming an adult, Julia's father, who lives just outside of New Orleans, has taken up guitar again and her mother has shown promise as a writer.

ANYTHING ELSE YOU WANT TO KNOW? ASK US!