Each year we invite a handful of new songwriters to play our festivals along with our many returning songwriters. Our Songwriters are recruited at other festivals, by reputation, attending live shows, referrals, our annual songwriting contest and direct inquiries. If you interested in performing as a Rising Star songwriter at one of our festivals read on.
We hire two levels of songwriters for our festivals. Hit Songwriters and Rising Stars.
Our Hit Songwriters write primarily for the country music world. Invited Hit Songwriters have written one or more #1 hit songs on billboard charts. Past performers include, Brett Jones, Gary Nicholson (Nashville Songwriter Hall of Fame), Leslie Satcher, Wynn Varble, Kostas (Nashville Songwriter Hall of Fame), Tony Lane, Sunny Sweeney, Karen Staley, Randy Montana, Erin Enderlin, Angela Kaset, Chuck Cannon, Billy Montana and Even Stevens (Nashville Songwriter Hall of Fame) among others.
Our Rising Stars are professional singer-songwriters that play in the pubs and restaurants during the festival. They perform the majority of the shows. These shows are in a songwriter round format with two to three songwriters. They’ll play in a different venue with different songwriters each day. We pay our Rising Star songwriters a talent fee for performing shows on a combination of days—Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. We offer host housing however we do not pay expenses. The fee is reflective of the experience of playing with other great songwriters and enjoying the experience of visiting Montana and Wyoming.
As a Rising Star you will play four to five shows during each festival. Show are in a songwriter round with one to two other songwriters. Each round is an hour and fifteen minutes. During each round you will play 3-4 songs. We are looking for songwriters who can go 10-15 songs deep in their songbook and are confident playing those songs before a live audience. Songwriters must have a library of songs that are both up tempo and slow ballads.
To be considered as a Rising Star you must be a professional musician that makes a significant portion of your income from performing and writing your own music. We review a songwriters songs, show schedule, social media presence, youtube videos, bio and website before making our selections. In addition to your ability as a songwriter we will evaluate your singing style and guitar playing.
Over the past eight years we have created a songwriting family where songwriters are in constant contact with us and each other. It is those personal relationships that make this festival special. Thus we do not hire songwriters through bookers or management companies. If you are obligated to a management company we encourage you to pay them their booking fee. We deal directly with the songwriter, and accept applications only from songwriters themselves. Invitations for the following year’s festivals are sent out annually in December.
Invitations for our 2023 festivals have been made. If you are interested in being considered as one of our Rising Star Songwriters in 2024, please send a CD of your original music and bio to the address below. Songwriters for our 2024 festivals will be chosen by December 1, 2023.
We are often asked, “why do I need to send a CD”? Simple, we want to see the liner notes, who wrote the songs, who played on the album, who produced it, is it professionally done. In todays electronic world it it easy to produce music. Writing and creating music is one thing, performing in front of a live audience and sharing the stage with other great songwriters is another.
Many of our Rising Stars are discovered at our Rocky Mountain Songwriting Contest. Past winners include, Michelle Rivers, Reese Sullivan, Dallas Remington, Goldpine (Ben & Cassie Wilson) and Aaron Bibelhauser, all regular Rising Stars at our festivals. The 2023 contest in closed. We will begin accepting songs October 15, 2024.
Thanks for your interest.
