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Winning national music contest on Georgia's mind

A number of area musical acts are looking forward to being a part of CBC's Searchlight competition

An athlete-turned-musician is one of the local talents competing in the 2022 CBC Music Toyota Searchlight contest.

The annual hunt for the nation’s next undiscovered musical talent started Thursday when submissions officially closed at 3 p.m.

With several prizes available, including a spot in the next CBC Music Festival lineup, artists from all over Canada are taking their shot, including some from Barrie and the surrounding area.

Georgia Bubel, 17, is in her last full year at Bear Creek Secondary School and while she also has passions involving painting, community theatre and gardening, she was a budding sports star.

“I grew up playing a lot of sports, but at age five, I was very set on soccer and I wanted to one day go professional. I even had dreams of making the 2022 Olympics,” said Bubel. “At age 13, on the first day of Grade 8, it was pouring rain and the field conditions were bad. I ended up tearing my ACL, which is rare for someone at that age.”

Told she could tear the same one or both down the road with competitive sports, Bubel ended up teaching herself how to play guitar.

“This old guitar was just sitting in our basement. I never grew up playing music or singing, but I was just drawn to it,” she said. “After about a year of playing around and learning on my own, I got some lessons and also began writing my own music.”

The song she submitted is called Off the Deep End and is inspired by a character in the Netflix series Hannibal.

Winning the competition is the ultimate goal for all artists involved, and Bubel doesn’t mind being a little cliche when saying so.

“It would mean the world to me, not to sound too cheesy,” she said. “Growing up, I always wanted to do something relatively impactful and do something I love with my life. While that was soccer for the longest time, music is what I love now and it would mean a great deal to me to win.”

Bubel is joined by several other local artists looking for a win.

Barrie country-rock band Johnson’s Creek hopes its submission of Burn It Up leads to a victory.

Mike Crombez (bass guitar/backing vocals) told BarrieToday should the band be fortunate enough to make it all the way and win, “we would be over the moon.”

“It would provide us with an opportunity to take our music to the next level,” he said. “We are always writing and tossing song ideas around, so being able to have a mentorship and an A-class recording session would be awesome and be very beneficial in taking our music to new heights.”

Myndset, whose real name is Ryan Woolhead, is hoping his hip-hop song, Run It Up, will make him the next CBC star.

“Winning this contest would be amazing. I have been making music for around 13 years now and winning a competition like CBC Searchlight comes with a lot of exposure and opportunities to reach new fans,” said Woolhead.

Voting for the first round ends May 30, with two more rounds to go after that until the winners are announced June 28.