Stella Heath debuted The Billie Holiday Project in 2019 and quickly started selling out houses all over the Bay Area. The band continues to tour from the Pacific Northwest to New York City. The Billie Holiday Project started first as a musical collaboration between vocalist Stella Heath and pianist Neil Angelo Fontano. It scaled up the production for the much-anticipated 2025 Birthday Show to celebrate Billie’s 110th birthday and features Big Band arrangements by Neil Fontano. The 10-piece band will feature some of the Bay Area’s finest swing musicians, including Clint Baker (Trumpet/Trombone), Johnny Bones (Saxophone), Vic Wong (Guitar), Robby Elfman (Saxophone/Clarinet), Daniel Fabricant (Bass), Riley Baker (Trombone), and Kamrin Ortiz (Saxophone). The performance will feature professional swing dancers for select songs.

Singing since the age of eight, Stella grew up in the North San Francisco Bay Area, steeped in her mother’s eclectic music collection. Some of her early musical influences were Louis Armstrong, Edith Piaf, Buena Vista Social Club, Billie Holiday, Tom Waits, Bod Dylan and Ella Fitzgerald. After studying acting at Interlochen Arts Academy and Syracuse University, she spent many years as a Shakespearian actress based out of New York City, where she began to sing Jazz again with the incredible Marjorie Eliot in Harlem. She returned to California in 2014 and began playing music full time, starting with the Bay Area-based band, Bandjango Collectif, an edgy band that mixes French Jazz Manouche, New Orleans Hot Swing, and Eclectic Global Folk.

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