WVCSD Artist of the Week: Naomi Valentino

As part of its weekly Artist of the Week series, the Warwick Valley Central School District recently highlighted high school senior Naomi Valentino for her work with the Drama Club and other performing arts. This year the WVHS Drama Club’s fall production is “Puffs, or Seven Increasingly Eventful Years at a Certain School of Magic and Magic,” which will run on Nov. 8 and 9. Her role in the comedy marks Valentino’s eighth year as a troupe member in one of the district’s drama clubs, a nearly uninterrupted streak that began when she was at Sanfordville Elementary.

“With the exception of fifth grade, I’ve done Drama Club every year since elementary school,” Valentino said. “My first play was ‘Peter Pan,’ and I did ‘Shrek’ the year after that. I just auditioned for the fall play, ‘Puffs,’ so I’m doing that in November.”

Valentino finds performing to be a freeing practice, something that she said comes easier to her than even talking with people when she’s not on stage.

“I just love the Drama Club here, and being up on stage is like a boost of confidence, especially when I’m singing. I can just be someone else, I’m not trying to think of the right words to say,” she explained. “It’s a very, like, almost therapeutic experience for me. I know it’s really helped with my confidence levels overall, especially in the past couple of years.”

Valentino also started doing community theater a couple of years ago, performing with both the Warwick Center for the Performing Arts and Warwick Reformed Church troupes. Valentino has always loved music and has been deeply involved with Warwick Valley music program throughout her school career. She played in the middle school band for a few years, but her main musical love is singing. In fact, if there is a choral group to be joined, Valentino is in it!

“I’m actually the treasurer for all three of the choirs this year — Bel Canto, Treble Choir and Meistersingers,” Valentino said. “Oh, and I also do the Jazz Choir, so we basically just get together and sing during lunch on Wednesdays.”

When she’s not on stage, you can find Valentino at the Wildcuts Salon, studying her other passion, cosmetology. Valentino’s goal is to become a stylist, a path she discovered through the WVHS CTEC program. She said she’d been feeling the stress of an impending college search and application process, and choosing a post-high school path as far back as her sophomore year. Then, she caught wind of an informational session about the high school’s popular in-house cosmetology program.

“I was like, you know what, let me just check this out,” she said. “I’ll go listen to what the teacher tells us about the course and see what I think of it. It sounded interesting, like something I might enjoy.”

On the first day of class in her junior year, Valentino said she felt instantly welcomed and supported by cosmetology teacher Kathleen Bettello and fell in love with the cosmetology program, which is part of Warwick Valley’s in-house CTEC program.

“I really see [being a stylist] as another art form,” said Naomi. “Immediately, it was something I felt naturally good at, like it felt easily understandable to me. Ms. Betello is such a great teacher – and just an amazing person all around for us – and it’s become something that I just... something that I really like being good at!”

Valentino loves all aspects of the class, hair to nails, cutting to styling. As the old saying goes, do something you love and you’ll never work a day in your life. Having discovered her passion in the cosmetology program, Valentino is quick to encourage other students who may have some anxiety about the future, or who are searching for their own ideal career, to explore all of the options available to them at the high school.

“If something is stressing you out, even just thinking about it, don’t do it,” she said. “That’s what was happening with me about college; I found a solution, something that I enjoy so much. So, something I’ve learned in the past couple of years is to just do what makes you really happy!”