By Kate Finnerty

Sophomore Alma Bitran is a trained musician, not an actress, but she will make her acting debut this year in a leading role for a short film called “First Chair.”

“I’m nervous about trying to act for the first time,” Bitran said. “It’s like going into a completely new environment that I have absolutely no experience in.”

The website for “First Chair” describes the film as “an uplifting comedy about expression through music.” The story revolves around a musician named Casey, Bitran’s character.

“It’s about a girl who plays cello,” Bitran said. “She’s also a composer. Her school arts department is short on money. No one really likes to listen to her music because they don’t really approve of it. But then she writes a piece for the orchestra, and that helps the orchestra get funding and continue to exist.”

Bitran said she viewed the film as a way for her to expand her interest in the cello, which she has played for nine years.

“I started when I was so young that I can’t really imagine not doing it,” Bitran said. “It gives you something to really work at and take up your time and feel yourself progressing and improving.”

The first two videos on Bitran’s YouTube channel are cello and vocal covers of Adele songs. In late 2013, director Colleen Davie Janes had been searching online for a saxophone player to cast in her next film, but changed the script to feature a cellist when she saw Bitran’s videos, she said.

“I don’t remember how I came across a cello player, but it was Alma about three years ago and she was playing her cello,” Davie Janes said. “And she was the cutest thing ever; she was singing Adele and playing her cello, and I just got chills and I went, ‘That’s my girl. That’s her.’”

Bitran said one reason she took on the acting role was to spread the message of the importance of classical music and the arts.

“I definitely see that classical music is being shut out by a lot of people, and they don’t appreciate it as much as they should. Casey’s fight is very much a real one that musicians have to fight every day,” she said.

Sophomore Rachel Eber and junior Jory Cherry play with Bitran in a band called “The Barbie Dolls.” Bitran plays the guitar, Eber plays the keyboard and Cherry plays the bass, while the drummer changes. According to Eber, the band performs original music at open mics and School Within a School lounge shows.

“Alma writes a lot of the songs because she’s more advanced musically than the rest of us, I think,” Eber said. “She’s really good at writing songs. She’s a good listener and a good leader.”

Eber described the band’s music as “psychedelic rock” but also said Bitran uses her knowledge of classical music.

“She’s a classical musician. It’s her main thing. She’s been playing cello all her life,” Eber said. “She uses a lot of classical techniques and a lot of knowledge of theory, and definitely incorporates all of that advanced knowledge into what she writes.”

Davie Janes said Bitran’s investment in her music is apparent.

“When you see Alma in her early YouTube videos, again, she’s adorable, and she’s got a quiet power to her,” she said. “She gets lost in the cello when she’s playing. The way she spoke to the camera, she has this gentle power.”

Davie Janes said it was unusual for her to cast someone with so little acting experience but that the risk paid off.

“I can tell you she’s actually an untapped acting talent,” Davie Janes said. “It’s too bad she doesn’t want to be an actress because she’s very good.”

Filming for “First Chair” will take place from Feb. 20 to Feb. 22, according to Davie Janes, and she predicts that the film will be completed in June or July. Davie Janes said she aims to have a screening in Boston, likely at Danvers High School, where filming will take place.

Bitran said that classical music is undervalued both at the high school and in general, and she wants to fight that misconception in “First Chair.”

“I see it in people who don’t really know what classical music is all about,” Bitran said. “They think that it’s boring and they think that it’s for old people. I just want to prove them wrong.”

Kate Finnerty can be contacted at [email protected]