Jessica Helms, Coordinator of Chapel Music for California Lutheran University, provides musical leadership for the many worship services on campus and directs the CLU Chapel Choir, an ensemble consisting of students, faculty, staff, administrators, and local residents. She also accompanies the CLU Choir and Cielo (Treble Choir), and coaches many of the music department’s vocal students.

Outside of CLU, Jessica is accompanist and assistant artistic director of the Gold Coast Concert Chorus. She graduated from California Lutheran University with a BA in Piano and Oboe and has earned an MM in Choral Conducting from California State University, Los Angeles, having studied with Donald Brinegar and William Belan. She has also done Master’s work in Collaborative Piano at Westminster Choir College in Princeton, New Jersey, where she studied with J.J. Penna and Dalton Baldwin. Jessica has accompanied many choirs, ensembles, and soloists at various Ventura, Santa Barbara, and Los Angeles County locations and has previously been director and organist of College United Methodist Church of Ventura and director of Las Voces del Mar, the women’s chorale associated with the Pacific Shores Philharmonic Foundation. She has had the opportunity to perform across the country and throughout Europe, as well as work with many leading artists in a master class setting including Jo-Michael Scheibe, David Lang, Libby Larson, Emma Johnson, and Daniel Beckwith.