Calgary hip-hot funk artist makes CBC Searchlight contest shortlist

Two thousand people applied for the CBC Searchlight 2018 music discovery contest and 10 finalists were recently announced. Five were chosen by public voting, five by a panel of celebrity judges and Calgary hip-hop funk artist Sinzere was one of those.

"It was overwhelming. I ran to my window, I opened it and pushed my head and I was like, 'We made it,'" Sinzere told The Homestretch on Friday.

"For the last 12 years I have been crafting and I just think that now, I have brought myself there musically so I think I have arrived to that place where it's time."

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She says her Searchlight submission, On Time, is about a personal journey.

"It's an ode to a person who has finally arrived at their true self. It's coming into your own, and arriving at the person you are going to be," she explained.

Her musical journey started with spinning records.

"I was in dance group, then I started DJing. I was self-taught. It was just something for fun, and then I ended becoming Western Canada's number one female DJ. It was an accident but incredible," Sinzere said.

"I started writing music in a group and that's led me to here."

Today, she describes her genre as hip-hop funk and she loves that women are finally finding their voice in a formerly male-dominated category.

"Hip hop derived out of the most impoverished places in the world. People used it as a way to inform the rest of the world of the injustices that were happening in these places. How people were treated," she said.

"I feel like it's time and it's time to stop putting all female hip-hop artists in the specific category. With everything going on with women empowerment, it's just the perfect timing."

The winner is announced Monday on CBC's q with Tom Power and Sinzere has some plans to pass the time this weekend.

"I'm probably going to have a little bit of cognac and relax."

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With files from The Homestretch and CBC'sEllis Choe