Julie McKenzie is a principal flute for San Francisco Ballet Orchestra and a principal flute for San Francisco Opera Orchestra, positions which she has held since 1991. She is a graduate of the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, where she studied with Lloyd Gowen. Other teachers have included Julius Baker, Paul Renzi, Peter Lloyd, and Keith Underwood.

McKenzie has participated as a fellow in Berkshire Music Festival at Tanglewood and has been a soloist at Carmel Bach Festival and Mendocino Music Festival. She was featured in a CBC television documentary with Jean-Pierre Rampal and has recorded for New Albion and Teldec Records, among others. She is on the flute faculty at the University of California at Berkeley.

McKenzie resides in San Francisco with her husband, bassist Ken Miller, and their son Sammy.