“I’ve been singing longer than I can talk,” Amber Mitchell, sophomore, said. Although she is versed in both acting and singing, music is her passion. “Acting is the words that you speak, but the tone or way you pronounce the lyrics and notes in music tells a lot more than any lines could,” she said.

At age six she began her professional career starring in musicals. As Mitchell has become older she’s had to work harder at acting because she describes herself as “much more of a singer than an actor.” She has also had to learn to juggle theater, school and friends.

“I’m a very ambitious person naturally which helped me with theater as well as making it into Jesuit last year,” Mitchell said. This year she transferred to West Linn to focus more on the things she loves. “I didn’t care as much about academics since I already knew what I wanted to do with my life,” she said. “Right now it’s less about excelling and more about doing what I love.”

She strives to try as many forms of theater that she can. With her new musical called “Jailbait” at The Badass Theater in Portland, she can do just that.

“My ultimate goal is that my theater and performances will get me to a position where I can make a difference in theater,” Mitchell said, “even if that means I’m just chorus girl #57 in a musical on Broadway that no one’s ever heard of.”

Mitchell is also a part of the Poetry Out Loud competition at West Linn  and looks forward to the schoolwide recitement of poems. “I just try to go into competitions and give it my all even if it’s not a stellar performance I just want to give a lot of raw emotion and be honest,” Mitchell said.

Aside from singing and acting, Mitchell enjoys writing scripts for musicals and hopes to be a writer on the side of her theater career. She wrote her first musical in eighth grade which was featured in Portland’s Fertile Ground Festival, where playwrights can produce their shows. “You can take advantage of any situation that you’re in and do some good, I just want to work with what life gives me,” Mitchell said.