Snapshot: Timmi Williams

As the weeks of spring semester fly by, mezzo-soprano Timmi Williams prepares for her final performance with Penn State’s Opera Theatre program. In late March, she will sing and perform alongside some 30 other opera students in a production of The Barber of Seville. Williams plays the lead female role of young Rosina. The production is scheduled for March 24 and 26 at the State Theatre.
Though she has spent all of her undergraduate years as well as her two years in the master’s program at Penn State, this is not where Williams thought her path would take her.

“I was meant to be a business major. I was set to go to West Liberty University,” she says. “But one day, my high school [music] director said to me, ‘Hey, do you know you’re really talented at this? You could have a career.’ So he set me up with an audition at West Liberty, and it’s all just kind of spiraled from there.”

The West Virginia native is currently studying vocal pedagogy and performance in the master’s program. However, she says that she’s gained just as much from her time spent in the spotlight as she has in the classroom.

“When I came to Penn State, I had a few stage experiences under my belt but not really a whole lot,” she says. “[The opera program] really catapulted me into an environment where I’ve been able to grow as an artist, grow as a performer, and to get the stage experience that I need to really feel comfortable in the professional arena.”

Williams, who has appeared in several productions with Penn State Opera Theatre, including as Jo in Little Women, has enjoyed playing Rosina in The Barber of Seville.

“Rosina is such a fun, fiery character,” she says. “She is a strong woman, and despite the men around her trying to dictate her circumstances, she controls the majority of the action — and she knows it! She is confident, smart, and witty in a time where women were typically portrayed as submissive characters. What’s not to love!”

As for Williams’s future plans, the world is her oyster.

“It’s all still kind of up in the air right now,” she says. “There is a potential for me to actually stay here at Penn State [to earn my] Professional Performance Certificate, so that’s a possibility I’m entertaining. My concrete plan, though, is to do the full audition circuit next fall. So really, my plan is to just cast my net to see what I get at this point.”

She will graduate in May with great memories and only good things to say about her time spent in the opera program.

“It’s kind of a bittersweet thing,” she says. “Like I said, I really love the program and the people. But I feel like I just got here — it’s only been two years! But I’m really looking forward to seeing what happens in the future.”