This is how she says it, "I have such a need to express myself and it is greater then all my fears, so I literally sing myself into existence.  I want my work to be positive.  I like music to go beyond the norm, so I use words, notes, vocables, and sounds to create imagery in music that speaks of hope, peace, love, and truth.  When I was very young, I had to run away into nature to survive because there was so much pain in the world.  It was there that I found my true teachers and I received my first real schooling."

Arlene, the second of nine children, was raised in Morenci and then Clifton, Arizona.  After graduating from high school, she went on to the Institute of American Indian Arts (IAIA) in Santa Fe, New Mexico.  She worked for one year, learning the art of designing, painting, silver-smithing, sculpture and studied the world of music.  She then spent the next year and a half as a LDS missionary among her people.  This was her first real encounter interacting with her tribe where she learned about the ways of her people.  On her release from her mission she moved to Provo, Utah.  She now calls it home.  There she attended both Brigham Young University and Utah Technical College of Orem to further her education.  She met and married her husband Mr. William Grant Williams, a Comanche from Oklahoma, while they both were attending BYU.  They had 7 children and now have 16 grandchildren.

While her husband worked in film, Arlene was able to begin her long and distinguished career in the performing arts right along with caring for their children.  Her concerts has taken her across the United States, up to Canada and to distant places such as Hawaii, Japan, China, Mongolia, and the Netherlands.  She wrote the majority of the music featured in the album entitled "Proud Earth".  The album was nominated in 1977 for a Grammy Award.

Arlene has also worked in both motion picture and television with such stars as Jay Silver Heels (Tonto), Chief Dan George, Wayne Heffley, and Dennis Weaver.  She played the mother of "Ishi" in a film of the same name which was telecast by NBC in December of 1978.  Arlene continues in acting, but music is her love.  She still takes time to give benefits for numerous charitable organizations and involves herself with self-improvement programs like the PTA, Boy Scouts, public schools, and services dealing with Native Americans.  She also works with the drug and alcohol abuse programs.  Her joy is working especially with children.

Arlene is also talented as an artist.  She is working with art forms that can go right along with her music.  "Fine Art," she says, "can be used to help encourage wholeness just as well as good music."  So today she is now working on reliefs and art pieces for a one person show...plus writing new songs for new recordings.  "My life journey is still underway," she says " and I haven't seen the end of it yet!"  Arlene Nofchissey Williams is again on her "Beauty Way."

Professional Credits