Hussar resident gives Alberta a voice nationally

Miriam Ostermann
Times Associate Editor

 

After Mary Ann Oxtoby lost two inspirational family members in one week, she decided to rekindle her love of singing – a talent that landed her a spot on the Canadian National World Karaoke Competition where she will represent Alberta later this month.
The mother of three from Hussar, whose professional singing career came to a standstill years ago when she chose to spend time raising her family, recently participated in the World Karaoke Championships in Calgary. Her performances, which included renditions of Lady Marmalade and When God-fearing Women get the Blues, grabbed the attention of the judges and solidified her win on Aug. 23 providing her with the opportunity to head to Winnipeg and represent the province.
“That hasn’t happened very much for me … the stars aligned, everything worked fine, and apparently the judges liked what they’d seen,” said Oxtoby. “I used to sing professionally and then I had my youngest two children 13 months apart and decided for my sanity’s sake that I needed to quit doing a few things and that was one of them. But I always sing at home, my radio is always on, and a playlist is always playing.”
Oxtoby started singing at a young age, often influenced by her father who she said could imitate a variety of sounds from animals, to machinery, to opera singers. Her learning therefore often consisted of singing the same notes as the artists in her CD player or the radio. With years of training through the choir in Hussar, Oxtoby attended Red Deer College for theatre arts performance, and was featured on the Alberta’s Finest album. However, with the arrival of her first son soon after, she decided to focus on her family and her singing career took a backseat.
Now, over a decade later, Oxtoby took a chance and sang in the Cowboys Star competition where she met another contestant who egged her on to tryout for the World Karaoke Championship – a judged competition.
“I think it’s about time, I think the circuit of performers of karaoke gets a little saturated and Mary Ann hasn’t entered some of this stuff in a while, and I was really pleased to see that it was her who had taken it because she absolutely deserves it,” said long-time friend and professional singer Abbey Powell, who met Oxtoby during the recording of Alberta’s Finest.
“It was nice to see that maybe politics didn’t prevail for once and someone with a lot of talent really made it through to the top, so that was really exciting to see. She’s a wonderfully committed mom and the community where she lives … she really is the backbone of a lot of the activities that happen within the Hussar community.”
Following the passing of her father to colon cancer and losing her grandfather a few days later, Oxtoby decided to start up a music lesson program and rebooted the dance club in her community. Despite logging hours of overtime in volunteer work, she also visits senior homes and lodges and performs where she performs.
“I got my voice from my dad and my grandpa was always front row and centre of every single show that I’ve ever done,” Oxtoby said. “Once the dust settled from losing both of them and we figured out what the new normal was, I said I think I want to do that more. That’s something that I do quite a bit and I like doing. They are the most appreciative audience members out there, because they’re so happy to have somebody to take them back to those old songs.”
Having recently returned to the studio to lay down some tracks, she is also working on her own songs, of which she currently has a hand full.
Oxtoby will be heading to Winnipeg to represent Alberta, along with the province’s top male singer, at the 2015 KWC Canada National Karaoke Championships Grand Finale on Sept. 18-20. Canada’s top male and female performers will then represent Canada against more than 40 countries in Singapore during the World Finals on Nov. 20-22.