{"id":21070,"date":"2018-07-05T10:25:59","date_gmt":"2018-07-05T14:25:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=21070"},"modified":"2018-07-05T10:25:59","modified_gmt":"2018-07-05T14:25:59","slug":"olivia-freeman-crowned-2018-aurora-teen-idol","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/olivia-freeman-crowned-2018-aurora-teen-idol\/","title":{"rendered":"Olivia Freeman crowned 2018 Aurora Teen Idol"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Brock Weir <\/strong><\/p>\n

Olivia Freeman has never set foot in a recording studio, but she\u2019s about to do just that after being crowned Aurora\u2019s 2018 Teen Idol on Canada Day.
\nOlivia, 14, who just graduated from Grade 8 at Holy Spirit Catholic Elementary School, was named the winner, with Vianna Ek taking the sash as first runner up.
\nOlivia, who will begin high school in the arts program at St. Elizabeth Catholic Secondary School in September, clinched the title with her pitch-perfect performance of Defying Gravity from the Broadway musical Wicked.
\n\u201cI am really shocked and excited,\u201d said Olivia after receiving her sash from Mayor Geoff Dawe.
\nSix of the eight Aurora Teen Idol contestants \u2013 Nicolina Bozzo, Rose Richardson, Olivia Freeman, Vianna Ek, Jessica Richer, and Nicole In \u2013 took over the stage on Saturday afternoon, performing not only before an audience of family, friends, and fans, but also a judging panel of industry professionals, including music producer Philip Trow, co-founder of Opera York, and singers Carla-Grace Colagouri, who evaluated each contestant on criteria ranging from pitch to diction, from tone quality to stage presence.
\n\u201cI was so surprised to see how much talent there was at such a young age,\u201d said Diego. \u201cI was very impressed.\u201d
\nAdded Carla-grace: \u201cI was looking for someone who acts when they are singing, not just singing but being a character when they sing. [Olivia] had beautiful stage presence.\u201d
\nDiego said he agreed, noting: \u201cShe is so young, but she was nailing those high notes like nothing else. It is a musical theatre piece and very hard to sing \u2013 as singers, we know what it takes to sing a piece like that.\u201d
\nIn addition to the chance to perform at various Town events over the next 12 months, and, of course, the glory, this year\u2019s aspiring singers had an added reason to audition: Highway 11 Entertainment came on board this year to offer the 2018 Aurora Teen Idol with a full original song production package, including the writing, arranging recording, mixing and mastering of one song, along with the storyboarding, shooting and post-production of a music video.
\n\u201cI am excited about the recordings because I have never done anything like that,\u201d said Olivia. \u201cI am really excited and it is a really great opportunity.\u201d
\nPerhaps it is not surprising Olivia chose a number from Wicked to wow the judges. She says she has always had a love for musical theatre, having immersed herself in that world at the age of eight.
\n\u201cI just fell in love with acting and being on stage,\u201d she says. \u201cI love The Sound of Music and I got my dream role of Maria this year at Marquee Theatrical Productions. I am just really thankful for this opportunity.\u201d<\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Olivia Freeman has never set foot in a recording studio, but she\u2019s about to do just that after being crowned Aurora\u2019s 2018 Teen Idol on Canada Day.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":21053,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[27,4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21070","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-arts-and-culture","category-general_news","category-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/2018-07-05-06.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-5tQ","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-14 17:28:43","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21070","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21070"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21070\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21053"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21070"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21070"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21070"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}