While the community prepares for the famous Confederate Railroad band to perform in Elizabethton in May, fans will also have the chance to witness one of their own take the stage, bringing her unique sound to a new level of recognition.

Julie Williams, an Elizabethton native, announced she will be opening for Confederate Railroad during their May concert.

“I was approached a few months ago at the Bonnie Kate,” Williams said. “This is a big opportunity to get my music out there.”

She said she has been in love with music from a very young age, holding onto a piano almost as soon as she could walk.

“It has always been a really important part of my life,” she said. “I have a strong music background.”

She started performing with family members when she was a teenager, and now she performs at venues across the region, including Jiggy Ray’s, the Moose Lodge and more.

Williams recently placed as a finalist in the Tennessee songwriting Competition, highlighting the public’s positive reception of her work.

“I get to be myself,” Williams said. “The creative spirit took over my life a long time ago.”

This creative spirit, though, had to take a back seat for a few years as a series of life events took hold of her priorities. On the positive side, she got married and had a son. On the negative, deaths in the family rocked her boat.

“It felt like it really put my life on hold,” she said. “My mom and my aunt were my biggest fans.”

Williams only got back into playing music for the community about a year ago, but she did so with renewed vigor after the experience.

“I feel like I owe it to myself to pour all of myself into my music,” she said.

The experience defines a large part of her musical expertise. Williams hesitates to put her music into any one specific genre, nor does she really think of her individual songs as belonging to any genre at all. To Williams, she plays East Tennessee music.

“I want to write songs people can relate to,” she said. “I cannot describe me.”

This fluidity in style reflects in her musical talents. Just about any string instrument you can think of, she can play, from guitar and banjo to the fiddle and auto-harp.

“Once I learned one of them, they all came to me,” she said.

At the end of the day, she said she wants to make music that touches people in a real way, such as “Coming Home to You,” a song she played at the songwriting competition that chronicles her experience moving to Virginia and then back to Tennessee.

“I want people to feel like I am creating a sound that is from here,” Williams said. “I want to sound like East Tennessee.”

Williams said she will be performing at Jiggy Ray’s on Valentine’s Day at 7 p.m. in Elizabethton. Her performance for Confederate Railroad will take place Sunday, May 24, at 7 p.m. Tickets are available at GoBetsy’s website.