About this Event
"I've pretty much been in the Midwest my entire life," Levi Birks told UMKC. In the summer of 2025 the UMKC Conservatory sent him to Metz, France, on his first trip abroad: twelve days at the Conservatoire Gabriel Pierné, where he took master classes, played the Marly Jazz Festival, and closed the trip in a concert for Kansas City Mayor Quinton Lucas, who was in Metz to declare the two cities sister cities.
He's a drummer from Olathe. At Olathe Northwest High School he earned a 2023 Kansas City Area Youth Jazz fellowship and played drums in the fellowship's Watson Ensemble, named for Bobby Watson and conducted by Greg Carroll; he's on the program's album 2023 FELLOWS. Now he studies jazz at the UMKC Conservatory, where the Truman Foundation's 2026 Sherman & Irene Dreiseszun Scholarship went to him, and in August he was the featured artist at the Blue Room's Monday jam.
He teaches drum set, percussion, and ensemble performance at Music House, and he works with students with special needs.
The Blue Room, 1600 E 18th St, Kansas City, MO 64108. Monday, October 19, 2026, at 7 pm. $10 general admission; complimentary for AJM members, musicians, and students.
Event venue & nearby stays
Blue Room, 1600 East 18th Street, Kansas City, United States
Concerts, fests, parties, meetups — all the happenings, one place.