A university student has won a radio competition to record a song written by a chart-topping songwriter.
Heather Merryn Ford, aged 19 from Bury St Edmunds, entered the contest run by Cambridge 105’s New Music Generator programme.
New Music Generator is broadcast every Wednesday evening (7pm to 9pm) on Cambridge 105 and is developing a strong following outside the station’s FM reception area. Young performers across East Anglia are now listening to the show online.
Cambridgeshire-based songwriter Simon Nelson and producer Chris Page together with the show’s presenter Tim Willett devised the competition.
Simon and Chris wrote Monsters to create a track that was contemporary and would fit into today’s Top 40 – a departure from material they’re used to recording as part of their current band project The Balancines. The pair have enjoyed previous chart success in the groups The Milltown Brothers and Fast Eddie.
Heather was a relatively late entrant having been passed an article on the competition in the Cambridge News by her grandmother.
“The track had a lot of feeling to it, so I was able to put my own emphasis on it,” said Heather, who has been singing since the age of four.
“We were pleased and surprised by the standard of entries out there, but it was quite clear who the winner was going to be,” said Simon. “Heather seemed to understand the sentiment very strongly and really embraced the song.”
The duo now plan to produce four songs sung by Heather, including Monsters and some of her own work, for release in the summer.