Josie Williams is a sophomore at Barlow High School who is involved in all of the performing arts that Barlow has to offer. She was in choir and band in middle school and also did some of the school plays at West Orient. “I couldn’t decide which one to sign up for so I decided to do both.”
She first got into performing arts because of her family. Her family was involved in musical theater, choir, and drums. “I wanted to be like my older siblings,” she states. Originally, Josie had only signed up for band and choir her freshman year. Then, her sister convinced her to audition for the school musical, which she had a blast doing. This led her to audition for Large Group as well. Last year at the regional acting competition, Barlow’s Large Group qualified for state.
When the last Thespian meeting came along, she decided she wanted to participate in the Thespian Board, so she prepared a speech, and then her fellow students voted her in. All students who are enrolled in Theatre 3-4, 5-6, and 7-8 are required to compete at the district acting festival competition where Josie and her classmate Nico Spillet received the Superior ranking for Duo Acting.
This year, Josie is the only sophomore girl in Concert Choir ,which is very rare to see—most female singers have to take Treble Choir and Advanced Treble Choir and then will be eligible to try out for concert choir. However, Josie was able to skip Treble Choir and was able to go straight to Advanced Treble Choir her freshman year. She is currently taking Concert Choir this year. She is an alto section leader so she plays piano and helps her fellow altos sing the right notes. Josie participated in the State Choir Competition last year and placed fifth overall as an alto while only being a freshman.
Josie is also enrolled in Stage Band where she plays percussion, which is drums, xylophone, and piano. Stage Band plays at football games and other various sporting events “I really like the community of the band.” They are different people than in her other classes, so it was nice for her to have a change. Although she isn’t in the competitive band this year at Barlow (since it is only for juniors and seniors), she is still looking forward to competing in it next year.
One of the things that Josie appreciates about the performing arts programs at Barlow is that all of the performing arts teachers know each other, so they don’t
