About Julie and her musician friends

Julie Roberts is an exceptional singer of jazz, blues, swing latin, and ballads. She has a rare gift of a mellow voice and an ability to communicate the soul and spirit of a song – from subtle ballads to gutsy blues to fast moving or witty numbers with complex rhythms. She loves the music she sings and sharing the emotion or idea of the song with an audience.

As a student in Brighton many years ago Julie sang in the rock band Sunn and with the Steve Ellinger Jazz Quartet.

After her family grew up she started to sing in folk clubs and was soon pressured by friends to do her own shows. For several years she sang folk and ballads, playing her guitar and keyboard supported by bass player Gary Holder. They performed around the south east of England in theatres, music clubs, pubs, churches, in the open air, many festivals and even the Pallant House Gallery in Chichester. During this time Julie made several guest appearances singing with big bands.

Julie and Gary recorded two CDs and were fortunate to have two outstanding jazz musicians with them on one or two tracks – violinist Mike Piggott, and pianist Mark Edwards.

Only about ten years ago Julie was invited by pianist Michael Hinton to sing one or two songs with him and Herbie Flowers in concerts they were organising. From 2016 Julie worked with Michael Hinton and together they developed a large repertoire of mainly jazz standards. Their concerts were well attended and often sold-out with audiences clearly impressed and eager for more. They recorded three CDs

Michael Hinton and Julie did only a few concerts after covid – all very successful – and at that stage Michael decided to retire from public performance.

Julie has long been singing in the Shoreham Singers by Sea choir, in fact from its beginning. Its first musical director was Michael Hinton and the current one is Mike Hatchard. Julie also sings in the prestigious classical choir, Sussex Chorus. For several years she sang in the Brighton gospel choir, Brighton Goes Gospel.

Julie had been a fan of Mike Hatchard’s piano playing and Jazz Breakfasts for many years so she was quite excited to be invited to sing in his “Jazz Breakfasts”. This has gone very well and their first CD together will be available in July. Mike has composed some impressive and pleasing music to accompany poems by WB Yeats, James Joyce and others as well as his own lyrics.

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