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A country artist with a sweet voice but a strong work ethic, Kalie Shorr took the hard road to stardom as she first made her name in Nashville as a teenager. Shorr was born and raised in Portland, Maine on July 11, 1994, where she was the youngest of seven children born to a single mother. Shorr soaked up a rich variety of influences from her siblings, and at the age of six she began writing songs. At 13, Shorr learned to play guitar, and before long she began posting videos of herself singing cover songs online. Shorr's interpretation of Rebecca Black's "Friday" earned her an unlikely celebrity fan in blogger Perez Hilton, and after extensive correspondence with her, he booked her to play his 34th birthday party, where she opened for the Backstreet Boys.

By this time, Shorr had already gained experience playing in a rock band in Portland and winning a Maine's Got Talent competition in 2010. While she liked rock, R&B, and hip-hop, Shorr was certain that her future lay in country music. Determined to make her mark, Shorr took extra classes so she could graduate from high school early, and then held down two jobs at once so she could raise the money to move to Nashville. By the time she was 19, Shorr had settled in Music City, and she landed a job at a bar while she searched for an audience for her songs. Things began looking up for Shorr when she became part of a weekly songwriter's showcase, the Song Suffragettes, that highlighted the work of talented female singer/songwriters in Nashville. The Song Suffragettes helped raise Shorr's profile and they gained a loyal local following.

With two of her fellow Suffragettes, Hailey Steele and Lena Stone, Shorr wrote a song about resilience titled "Fight Like a Girl." Shorr released an independent digital single of "Fight Like a Girl" in January 2016, and the tune quickly won positive press and airplay on digital radio and social media sources. March 2016 saw the release of an eight-song collection of demos from Shorr, The Y2K Mixtape, and a second single, "He's Just Not That into You," appeared the following September. The independent success of Shorr's two singles spread the news about her and her songs outside Nashville, and in March 2017 she dropped an EP, Slingshot, that included "Fight Like a Girl" and "He's Just Not That into You" along with three new tracks. ~ Mark Deming

With a strong voice that garnered notice as a preteen, Candi Carpenter's passionate accounts of betrayal, empowerment, and monsters both real and figurative were rooted in the country music tradition before moving into alternative territory. A dalliance with Sony Music Nashville produced the lauded "Burn the Bed" in 2016. Their gradual shift in sound coincided with a series of collaborations with Brandi Carlile, culminating in 2021's When the Asteroid Comes EP, which still embraced twang, as did the duo outing Here Comes Church of Roswell with Josh Doyle. Going the independent route, they next addressed identity, gender roles, and sexual orientation on 2022's "Exorcist" and 2023's "Novels About Vampires," both of which embraced a more dedicated alternative pop/rock sound.

Candi Carpenter was born in Toledo, Ohio and grew up in Lansing, Michigan. Raised in a musical family, they began taking music lessons at the age of six, learning to play saxophone and piano. Carpenter was in bands and sang in choirs both at church and in school, performed in the family's band, and developed a keen talent at a young age. When Carpenter was in sixth grade, they bluffed their way on-stage at a Vince Gill concert to yodel for the country star; by age 11, they'd been discovered by a record producer, who signed them to a contract. At 15, Carpenter left school and relocated to Nashville, Tennessee, where they were playing local honky tonks despite being underage. Veteran country artist Jack Greene heard Carpenter and hired them as part of his band, where they acted as his duet partner. Carpenter toured regularly with Greene, and made several appearances at the Grand Ol' Opry. However, they grew frustrated with the terms of their production and management deals -- they had little say in their own creative future. Determined to assert creative independence, Carpenter cut ties with their managers, wriggled out of a bad marriage, and began working multiple day jobs to finance work on recordings that would allow them to follow their heart as a musician and songwriter.

In 2014, Carpenter landed a deal with CTK Management, and a recording contract with Sony Music Nashville soon followed. In November 2016, they released their first single for Sony, a bitter tale of a woman betrayed called "Burn the Bed." It was well-received by publications like Rolling Stone, which named Carpenter a new country artist to watch. They remained rooted in country on a pair of Brandi Carlile-produced songs, "The Astronaut" and a belted ballad "Little Sparrow," in 2019. A collaborative EP with Carlile that bridged country, folk, and adult alternative pop, When the Asteroid Comes, appeared on CTK Records in 2021. The same year brought a five-song EP, Here Comes Church of Roswell, on Studio 42 under the moniker of Church of Roswell, Carpenter's alt-country duo with Josh Doyle.

In 2022, the singer and songwriter signed with House of 42 (under Red Light Management) and indie label A-Frame Records, forecasting a further shift in sound. Taking a form more in line with alternative pop/rock, the identity-themed "Exorcist" saw release in December of that year, with the like-minded "Novels About Vampires" following in March of 2023. A tour in support of Rainbow Kitten Surprise kicked off in May. ~ Mark Deming & Marcy Donelson

A vocalist and songwriter with one foot in country and the other in pop, Tenille Arts became a breakout artist in her native Canada before her star began to rise in a major way in the United States. Originally from Saskatchewan, Arts was just 13 when she began singing her own songs, and was a seasoned pro at 21 when she released her first single. Arts' clear, evocative voice, atmospheric melodies, and knack for capturing the ups and downs of romantic relationships helped her make an impression with her self-titled 2016 EP (which included the tracks "What's He Into" and "Wildfire and Whiskey") and the 2017 album Rebel Child (featuring "Cold Feet"). But the plaintive "Moment of Weakness" helped her find a larger audience in America when the song was featured on a popular reality show, winning her a record deal that resulted in 2020's Love, Heartbreak & Everything in Between and 2021's Juno-nominated Girl to Girl. She then signed with the Dreamcatcher Artists label for her intimate 2024 LP, To Be Honest.

Tenille Arts was born on April 19, 1994, in Weyburn, Saskatchewan. She grew up listening to country music, and when she was eight years old, a neighbor heard Tenille singing a Shania Twain song in her backyard and told her mother she believed the youngster had talent. Soon Arts was taking lessons in piano and voice, and when she was 13 she started writing her own songs. It wasn't long before she was performing at showcases and talent competitions in Canada, and in 2009, she posted a video online of her performing an acoustic version of Taylor Swift's "Fifteen." The clip was seen by a music manager in Nashville, and he made an offer to represent her. Arts briefly relocated to Nashville, but she came home to Canada to finish high school, write more songs, work on her performing skills, and gain some life experience.

In 2015, Arts had made a name for herself as a songwriter and was working with other tunesmiths in Nashville, and Noble Vision Music Group in the Music City offered to sign her to a publishing contract. This time she accepted the offer and moved to Nashville as she introduced herself to the most important country music community in America. 2015 saw Arts release a single, "Breathe," that benefitted cystic fibrosis charities, an important cause for her ever since she gave dance lessons to a young girl living with CF; the track became a Top Ten digital country single in Canada. In 2016, she issued a six-song self-titled EP that topped the Canadian digital country charts and broke into the Country Top 100 in the United States.

The Canadian Country Music Association recognized Arts' growing success with a 2016 nomination for their Discovery Artist Award, while the Saskatchewan Country Music Association presented her with the Emerging Artist Award that same year, along with the Album of the Year prize for her EP. October 2017 saw the release of Arts' first full-length album, Rebel Child; featuring the successful single "Cold Feet," the set rose to number two on the digital country sales charts in Canada, and peaked at number 17 in the United States.

Arts' profile in America received a big boost in January 2018 when she appeared on the reality dating series The Bachelor, singing her song "Moment of Weakness." Suddenly the track gained new life on radio and streaming services, and the following March, Arts signed a recording contract with Reviver Records. Her first single for the label, "I Hate This," appeared in July 2018, and "Mad Crazy Love" followed in September 2018. A handful of 2019 singles, including the hit "Somebody Like That," preceded the January 2020 release of her second album, Love, Heartbreak & Everything in Between. Working quickly, Arts returned in 2021 with the single "Give It to Me Straight" and "Over You Is You," the latter a duet with Matt Stell. Both songs appeared on her third album, Girl to Girl, which arrived in October 2021 and earned a Juno nomination for Country Album of the Year. The following year, Arts signed with the Dreamcatcher Artists label and in 2023 released "Jealous of Myself," a version of which featured LeAnn Rimes, as the first single from her next album. Follow up tracks like "Wonder Woman" and "Next Best Thing" revealed a more personal brand of songwriting that characterized her fourth album, To Be Honest, released in May 2024. ~ Mark Deming