Actor, clarinetist/saxophonist, debater, sailor, runner.
Wait a minute, this can’t be all one person. But it is! Fine Arts Boosters of Kingston High School’s (FAB) featured artist for November is Emma Walker.
“I’m an incredible show off” claims this quiet spoken (at least in our interview) lifelong Hansvillian.
“I like people to feel things and I feed off of other’s energy — it’s intoxicating.”
Marching in the band with her clarinet or jazzing it up with her alto sax, Emma said, “I love music as much as acting but acting is what I want to do with my life.”
She will travel to Los Angeles to audition for State University of New York’s Purchase College, a school that feeds into New York City’s theater scene.
“I would like to act on screen — the beauty of it, the gorgeous composition. It is eternal. The film will be here in 80 years and people will look back.”
In the meantime, “The North Kitsap music scene is so cool — the stuff that comes out of here like bands, such as “Blood Pump” and “Isthmusia,” she said, which include Kingston High grads.
Emma and her twin siblings who play with her in the jazz band live with their parents, both teachers. She grins, “Our home is very teacher-like. I’m quite sure they wish I was more organized.”
Last spring, Emma went with three others to the Debate Nationals in Baltimore. Wednesdays before school she is at Debate working on her interpretation presentation.
“Some days, I don’t get home from school until after 9 p.m.” As far as last year’s AP Chemistry, “it kicked my tail,” she said.
Then there is running and her passion for sailing with the high school sailing team through Parks and Rec. And a love of small plane flying. Agreeing with past FAB featured artists, she sees little bullying at KHS.
“Students [are] really chill. Gay/Straight Alliance posters are not touched,” she said. “If one participates or not in homecoming dress-up days, no one criticizes. Being a small school saves us. In big schools, decency is shoved aside.”
Commenting on national and world events, Emma thinks the October drama production “Election” asks the question, “What is a fact anyway?”
“We are in a very exciting time, with so much turmoil, and I don’t think people realize it,” she said. “Education, very broadly, not just in schools, is the top issue. It is troubling that people don’t take time to find out what they truly believe but follow blindly.”
If you ever wonder how Kingston and North Kitsap benefit from the performance and visual artists among us, consider this amazing young woman’s heartfelt answer: “Art is a reflection of everything an artist feels. It shows what is beautiful and great in itself; it reflects the universally understood greatness of a community.”
— Contact FAB Spotlight columnist Marilyn Bode at Lidenbode@aol.com.