Victoria Banks

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It’s a long way to the Grand Ole Opry stage from Muskoka, Canada, where Victoria spent the long winters of her childhood listening to her Dad’s collection of antique phonograph records and studying classical voice and piano. But this ASCAP and SOCAN award-winning songwriter – the writer behind the Sara Evans hit “Saints & Angels” and 3 of Hearts’ “Arizona Rain” – made it every step of the way. Now she has made history with her co-written Jessica Simpson hit “Come On Over” - the highest debuting new artist single ever on the Billboard country charts.

“I was earning a Zoology degree in Toronto and the lyrics just started pouring out, right in the middle of a calculus exam,” she says. “It didn’t take long to figure out that songwriting was my calling - I couldn’t help but pursue it.” That pursuit brought her to country music mecca Nashville, Tennessee, where she lived on friends’ couches, pinching pennies and writing songs in the cold with her mittens on as her savings trickled away. “I couldn’t work in the USA without an employer to sponsor me for a visa. Instead, I made music my full-time job. I wrote songs all day and spent night after night in the cheap seats at the Bluebird Café, listening to master writers like Don Schlitz and Pat Alger. Little did I know I would be performing alongside those very writers one day!”

She was down to her last $20 when she signed her first publishing deal. Since then she has become one of Nashville’s most in-demand songwriters, collaborating with artists like Gretchen Wilson, Julie Roberts and Jessica Simpson (with three songs on Jessica’s upcoming CD) and has penned songs for many more. Now a staff songwriter at Sony/ATV Nashville, she’s won the Unisong and two USA International Songwriting Competitions, had songs featured in TV and movies, harmonized with the legendary Patti Page on her new Curb CD, and toured North America as a backup singer and acoustic guitar player for artists like Pam Tillis and Crystal Shawanda. She’s headlined music festivals in Florida, Toronto and Belfast as an acoustic act, and has shared the stage with Jamie O’Neal, Aaron Tippin, Billy Kerrington and the supergroup Alabama.

Stylistically somewhere between Sara Evans and Sheryl Crow, Victoria’s music is “Smart Country”; very commercial, but set apart by an emotional and lyrical sophistication that looks past the surface of life. Her self-penned debut CD “You Don’t Know Me” has been called “fully formed, radio friendly, new school country-rock...superb songwriting with lots of clever wordplay.” A new CD is pending release later this year.

WOULD YOU LIKE TO HOST A LIVE PERFORMANCE BY VICTORIA? Click here for information on booking a “House Concert”.