Julie Christensen

Sometimes listing an artist's music under one style that fits it best is a little hard to do — sometimes it's almost impossible. With Julie Christensen the latter fits. Her music is a smooth mix of blues, R&B, jazz, and even a little pop and western swing. Maybe that's because she has sampled a little of it all along the path of her career and didn't find any she didn't like in some way.

Singer and songwriter Christensen was born and raised in Iowa. Her first band was a little country and western swing group, which also played rock. In the late ‘70s she moved to Texas and picked up jazz and blues. A few years later, she headed to sunny California and found post-punk floating about. She soon joined a punk band, Divine Horsemen, and even married one of its founding members, Chris Desjardins. The group released one EP and three albums while Christensen was with them.

By 1987 the marriage was over, her part in the band was over, and she was on her own again. As luck would have it, she was invited to become a backup singer for the well-known Leonard Cohen. It gave her the chance to tour through the United States, Canada, and even into Europe, and to spread her wings some.

In 1996, Christensen released her first solo album, Love is Driving. Four years later, she finally recorded a sophomore work, Soul Driver. Some of the superb tracks on her albums that fans might want to sample are "The Moon Was," "I Have a Photograph," "Shipwreck," "Biggest Fool of All," and "Sweet Sound."