// BBC UK NEWS — CRONACA
From city centre busker to supporting Sam Smith
Josie Oliver will be opening for Sam Smith at the London Coliseum on 16 September
When she was a teenager, musician Josie Oliver was performing in pubs and could regularly be seen busking in Stoke-on-Trent city centre.
Now, the 24-year-old singer-songwriter is preparing to support Sam Smith when they play at the London Coliseum on 16 September.
Oliver, from Stone, Staffordshire, was one of 10 up-and-coming artists who won the chance to open for Smith at their upcoming residency shows in Manchester and London.
She said she first heard of the competition, run by Smith and BBC Introducing, when her mother saw it and told her she would be "perfect for this".
"I just thought it was never going to happen but I did it anyway," Oliver told BBC Radio Stoke.
"Then I kind of forgot about it until I got the email through and I had to check it was real so many times because I was like 'surely not'."
She said she was "buzzing" for the opportunity, adding that it meant a lot, as an unsigned artist, to be given this kind of platform.
"It's such an incredible opportunity. I'm so excited."
Josie Oliver said she was "buzzing" for the opportunity to perform with Sam Smith