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Julia Williams, accordion

Accordionist Julia WIlliams performs as a soloist and with groups as a specialist in classical, swing musette, tango, and contemporary music. She studied piano accordion and chromatic button accordion as a youth with Dee Langley of Minneapolis. She has degrees in accordion performance from the University of Missouri, Kansas City and music literature/historical musicology from the University of Colorado, Boulder. In Kansas City she studied with Joan C. Sommers and was a featured soloist in master class with Friedrich Lips of Moscow’s Gnessin Institute of Music. Her performance competition prizes include the American Guild of Music’s North American Invitational Championship and the Accordionists and Teachers Guild United States classical solo championship. 

Now a resident of Lincoln, Williams first cut her teeth as a performer in the lobby of the legendary Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis. She has a keen interest in music for the theater and multi-disciplinary performance. Her theatrical credits include productions of ‘A Fiddler on the Roof,’ ‘A Three-Penny Opera,’ ‘The Doctor in Spite of Himself,’ and ‘The Government Inspector.’ She has played with the Basilica of St. Mary Choir in Minneapolis, the Tulsa Philharmonic chamber ensemble, and The Prairie Ensemble in Champaign, Illinois. Recently she was tapped by the Sioux City Symphony for its live music production of the film ‘The Godfather,’ and by the Omaha Symphony for its live music production of the film ‘Ratatouille.’