Video: A leap of faith for a Nashville dream
Legend has it that country music superstar Dolly Parton moved to Nashville the day after she graduated high school, with dreams of becoming a country music star - and it worked.
Trista Wheaton of Canandaigua, N.Y., will move there with the same dream this June. But she's only 14.
Wheaton has the voice of a 25-year-old and the ambition of a college graduate. She won her middle school's "Idol" contest two years out of the three she competed and sings at local hangouts and open mic nights.
But her dreams are much bigger than her little upstate city can accommodate. She plans to move to the Mecca of country music this summer to show the biz what she's made of.
"I'm more excited than I am nervous," Trista said. "Something's going to happen, I'm going to make sure."
Trista has never been to Nashville. Neither have her parents, Bill and Angela, or her three younger siblings. But the six plan to move out of their home in Canandaigua, where they have lived most of their lives, and into a home in Tennessee this June.
"The primary reason we're going is to help Trista pursue her dream," Bill Wheaton said.
A brush with a few writers from the Volunteer State convinced Bill Wheaton that's where his family needed to be if his daughter was going to be a star.
Last summer, Trista sang at the Colgate Country Showdown, a contest for budding country musicians. She made it to the state level and caught the eye of Ken and Barry Somerville, two country music insiders who encouraged Bill Wheaton to move his family to Nashville to get Trista noticed. Bill Wheaton said the offer was enticing. He and his wife hate Upstate New York winters, and, as a self-employed paint-repairman, he said he shouldn't have trouble finding work there. It's also a great place to find gigs for Trista.
Bill said he has been scouring the Internet daily to find out more about their future hometown.
"It's the place to be if you want to truly pursue country music," he said.
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<param value="transparent" name="wmode" />width="425" height="355" wmode="transparent" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" src="http://www.youtube.com/v/vopoEYrpjjghl=en"></embed></object> Trista said moving to a new school, a new state and a new community will be difficult, but it's a challenge she's willing to take if it means getting more opportunities to sing. She still remembers the first time she fell in love with country music: She was 9 years old, watching Shania Twain on TV. She said she's not out to become one of those pop stars with droves of paparazzi following her around. She just wants to be a great musician that other girls look up to. "Pop music is revolved around just fame and money," she said. "I think country is revolved around religion and the love of music." And there's no better place to get a good start than Tennessee. Nicknamed "Music City," Nashville is home to the Country Music Hall of Fame, the Grand Ole Opry and Country Music Television. It's also home to many smaller clubs, open mic nights and a lot of scouts looking for fresh talent. "Me and my wife believe she's got the talent if we find the right people," Bill Wheaton said. <em>Contact Daily Messenger writer Stephanie Bergeron at (585)394-0770, Ext. 255 or sbergeron@mpnewspapers.com.