C to C Canadian Country Music Insider “Fresh Face Friday”

Fresh Face Friday | Featured Artist | Friday, July 12th, 2024

Our pick this week for “FRESH FACE FRIDAY” Featured Artist is Haley McNeil!

This young 21 year old powerhouse vocalist/artist is from Teeswater, Ontario and is fast emerging onto London Ontario’s flourishing music scene. Her music journey began with her singing at the age of 3 years and progressed to playing solo gigs at 12 years old and now at the age of 21! 

I grew up listening to classic rock and 90’s rock with my parents, but listened to a lot of classic country with my Papa. As I got older, I had influences in school from friends who liked country music which led me to fall in love with the genre and when I started performing live at 12. I added more and more country on my set lists and realized it was my favourite genre to sing & perform. Since then I’ve countrified classic rock songs and pop songs to make them my own having a country twist to each of them.

We love when artists do that, it’s so much fun and their fans get to connect with the artists on a whole different level. 

With her rich nostalgic blend of Contemporary Country & Classic Southern Rock —you can hear the influences from Miley Cyrus to Stevie Nicks, Lainey Wilson to Lynyrd Skynyrd, Zach Bryan to Janis Joplin—so Haley’s sound literally resonates with audiences of all ages and music genre preferences.

She debuted her first original song “Guardian Angel” live onstage, at the age of 13, and released her first original single “Dear Future Self” on Spotify in March 2020. The latter was named *SONG OF THE DAY* by Front Porch Music within a few short weeks of its release.

In the Spring of 2024, Haley completed her final year at Fanshawe’s acclaimed “Music Industry Arts” Program (MIA) —where she was honoured with two awards: “Artist of The Year” and “Roots Vocalist of The Year”— in addition to touring with the London City Roots  concert series. Congratulations!!! 

Haley will be performing in the Emerging Artist Showcase at the North Of Nowhere Music Festival on July 19th.  We wish her Good luck in the competition! Not only did she qualify there but she was also selected as one of the Top 6 Finalists for “Lucknow’s Music In The Fields” Emerging Artist Showdown 2024. That’s amazing! Congrats! 

She was thrilled when she opened for Owen Riegling at his last show of the Bud Light Tour in a bar called Harley’s in Mildmay where Owen and her sang together in their early years performing.

Haley’s cover of Colin James “Voodoo Thing” received recognition from Colin James himself, on her performance on Facebook! That was huge for Haley considering she was a big fan herself of him having grown up listening to his songs. 

She has performed at the London Music Hall twice for “Share the Land” — a Canadian classic songs concert, put together by the Music Industry Arts students at Fanshawe College, to showcase the talent coming out of the program.

Her dream collaboration would be to work with Miley Cyrus as she was one of Haley’s biggest influences growing up and still to this day, she looks up to her. If the opportunity ever presented itself, she’d love to work with Zach Bryan, as she’s been a big fan of his work since 2019 and continues to love all of his new music.

I will be releasing music later this year and I am so excited for y’all to hear it!! I’m just a small town country girl who’s chasing her dreams for the big stage!

Well she’s not alone, we’re right there cheering Haley on! We believe she has what it takes to do well in the music industry and with a voice like hers, it’s just a matter of time! GO HALEY GO!!