'I was just shaking': Maureen Trainor wins top P.E.I. spot in CBC Searchlight

Singer-songwriter Maureen Trainor is P.E.I.'s finalist in CBC's Searchlight competition for Canada's next great musical acts. 

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This is just more than I ever could have imagined.— Maureen Trainor

Judges voted Trainor's song Goodbye best of 11 Island entries, CBC announced Tuesday. 

"It's crazy, it's absolutely crazy," Trainor told CBC Radio: Mainstreet's Angela Walker just after she saw the news online. "I was just shaking."

"This is just more than I ever could have imagined," she said.

'Great stuff'

"Maureen has been writing songs for over two decades, but it's only now she's recording them in the studio? I would have told her to do this earlier as the world could have been that much better with her music out there," said Searchlight industry panelist Eric Alper.

"Let's not wait another 20 years for the next batch. Great stuff!" he enthused.

Trainor will now compete in national semi-finals against the other 22 regional winners plus the two acts who received the most votes, for a chance at making the national top four, and competing to win a grand prize worth more than $46,000.

She's been discussing plans for recording an album, she said, no matter what happens with the contest.

"It kind of has made it real, and I'm just so, so happy and grateful for everybody out there," Trainor said, adding she's received encouragement from friends and strangers. 

In 2016, singer-songwriter Dylan Menzie of Belle River won the P.E.I. part of the contest with his song Kenya, and also made it to the top four nationally.

To find all the entries and to vote go to cbcmusic.ca/searchlight. Voting is open until this Friday at 4 p.m.

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