ST. GEORGE, Utah — There are more than 16,000 high school students who enter the national YoungArts competition each year. Of those, about 478 won it this year, and only eight came from Utah.
Half of them went to one school in St. George, the only campus in the state to have multiple winners.
There are even more astronomical odds at play. Of those 463 winners, only 150 get the highest distinction honor. And of the three Utahns who did, two went to that same St. George school: Utah Arts Academy.
“Music is a part of my everyday life. I'm always listening to music, I'm always singing, I'm always singing with my friends,” said Utah Arts Academy senior Roxie Sparling. “Just connecting with other people through music is what really brings me the most joy.”
Sparling joined junior songwriter Emerson Williams, senior musical theater actress Melanie Petersen and sophomore songwriter Sadie Barrowes as winners of 2024 YoungArts.
“I think that art is a very big thing down here, like all types of art,” Petersen said.
Past YoungArts winners that went on to greater success in their later years include “Dune” actor Timothée Chalamet, and singers Nicki Minaj and Billy Porter.
Sparling and Williams were given the additional honor of being named winners of distinction. They will both be going to Miami next month for a week of mentoring from arts professionals. They could also be among the 60 named as a Presidental Arts Scholar — the highest honor any arts student in the country can achieve.
“I'm so excited to just get new feedback from people I've never met and pros in the industry and meet new people and connect with new people,” Williams said. “Co-writing is such an important part of songwriting. And so being able to co-write with other songwriters. I feel like it's going to be such a big step.”
All four say that being part of a high school that specializes in the arts is a big reason why they were honored.
“I don't think that I could have won this award without coming to this art school because I didn't even know about this award,” Barrowes said. “I didn't go to an art school last year and that's when I kind of started to discover that none of the electives really came to me. None of them really felt very helpful. Like they would help for where I wanted to go. And songwriting really helped me figure out more about myself.”
