Kat Downs is originally from Green Bay, Wisconsin and began studying music in the 2nd grade. She started with the piano first, and then mastered the flute. In 1998 she graduated from Saint Norbert College with a BA in Music. Her focus being in Flute Studies, Method classes, Conducting and Music Theory. During this time Kat performed in wind ensembles, symphonies, pit orchestras, flute choirs, and woodwind choirs. Kat toured through Florida with the college Flute Choir, and through Australia with the College Wind Ensemble.

After graduation she taught private flute and piano lessons (for more than 50 students) and served as a band instructor for a private school. She was also the Assistant Music Director for the First English Lutheran Church in Appleton, Wisconsin, and the section leader for the Green Bay Youth and Junior Youth Symphony Orchestras. In her spare time she did some transposition and composition work. This is when Kat started writing her own non-classical music. “I was influenced by an eclectic mix- Billy Joel to Dire Straits, Ben Folds Five to the Pet Shop Boys, Weezer to Leonard Cohen. Initially, the songs I wrote would fit into the "folk" genre.” Kat moved to California in 2001 and joined a cover band, Good Natured Mortals, to learn more about performing in rock bands. “Good Natured Mortals was a great project for me... as I was never trained on how to sing, I had finally found a group of people I was comfortable enough with to really let loose and explore my voice and how it works.”

During that same time Kat also performed her own solo music at coffee houses all over the Bay Area. “I topped off one year at 46 performances in one year - coffee houses alone. Being that I was from a classical background I actually used to perform with a music stand in front of me with all my music/lyrics written out.” In 2004 Kat joined Sparrows Point, which is a theatrical heavy metal band. They opened for WASP at the House of Blues on Sunset in L.A. Kat was introduced by a fellow singer/songwriter to Bill Bentley, a musician and recording engineer, and started work on recording a full length album. Head of Revelations came out in 2005 and is available on CD Baby and iTunes and just about everywhere else on the web.

Kat helped to co-found the Contra Costa Songwriters project and was in included in their compilation CD. The Oasis Pop Volume V compilation. (Disk 1, Song 3!!) In 2005 she opened for Lennon and Shannon Curfman at the Pound SF.

Since 2003 Kat has participated in the Tune Smith Series, and been included in recordings for True Margrit, Mark Steurvant, and Lindasusan Ulrich. She sat in with Vicious Fish, and True Margrit on television. In 2006 her own band, Kat Downs, was featured on the local television show “San Francisco Sound” on Comcast in 2006.

In 2008 Kat was asked by Wily West Productions to compose an all original score for the world premier of a new play.

“I would say my music is more inspired by stories. The little ins and outs of life- the rise and fall of the day. I like listening to the natural rhythms in life- the patterns of sentences, the way the pitch of a person’s voice varies during a conversation. Sometimes just listening to the din of a busy street I’ll suddenly hear a song in all of it. Music to me feels like a person I live my life with. I write music because I can’t help it. I hear everything in my head from symphonies to country music, and I try to write down as much of it as I can.”

Kat’s new album is due out in early 2009. Kat promises, “It is definitely more rock than my last album- the songs are darker, and all of them are on piano, which is my much stronger instrument. These songs, I would say, are more "me" on a day to day basis than the first album. I've been working with Geoff Lyman on guitar, Bud Helms on drums, Craig Petit on bass, and Lindasusan Ulrich on backup vocals.” With her new CD close to completion, Kat continues to write, produce and perform.