Raye Zaragoza

Los Angeles-based singer-songwriter Raye Zaragoza is a powerful storyteller who has found multiple avenues of expression. She writes the music for the Netflix show Spirit Rangers, which features an all-Native American cast and writers’ room. She played Tiger Lily in the hit 2024  Broadway tour of Peter Pan as part of a cast full of Native actors. And her latest album Hold That Spirit features a stylistically broad array of songs deeply informed by her identity as a woman of mixed Indigenous, Asian and Latina heritage. A luminous presence on stage, she first gained national recognition in 2016 with her song “In The River,” which was written to protest the Dakota Access Pipeline. A captivating Tiny Desk performance followed. Zaragoza continues to evolve, a journey she evokes in the feminism-powered folk and pop tunes on Hold That Spirit, like the soaring opening track “Joy Revolution,” a collaboration with fellow LA-based activist-artist MILCK. Inspired by the creative riches of LA’s Indigenous music scene, she brings emotional truths from a community that largely flies under the pop cultural radar.

This program is part of YBG Festival’s 2025 Indigenous Performance Series, with support from the San Francisco Arts Commission.