Bay City Country Music Fest to include country’s Waylon Hanel

“When I first started playing, my mother asked me to sing, and I said no,” Hannell said. “One day I came home from school and my guitar was gone. Okay, I’ll try. If she didn’t, I wouldn’t have been able to do anything I’ve been doing.”

From there, in his late teens, he frequently performed at local bars and other venues in the area. When he was about 18, 103.9 radio DJ Dan Richards (along with his wife Georgen) gave him the chance to visit Texas with country music singer and songwriter Bernie Nelson. rice field.

“They collected the money and flew me and my dad and mom over there,” Hanel said. “I got to write songs with him for four days and that’s kind of where my songwriting all started. I was an entertainer, so I didn’t know much about it.” Of course, the more you do something, the better you’ll get at it.”

As an entertainer, Hanel prefers the performance side of things, but collaborates with friends when he has song ideas. He said it’s great to have friends who can be part of the process.

Hannell spent the last four days with Nelson working on what is now his first album and single release of the same name, ‘New Old Outlaws’. The single peaked at number 54 on the Nashville Music Road chart.

“I think it was a pretty good debut single as an independent artist without a label,” Hannell said. “It’s worked out very well for us. We’ll probably release a new single here (September) and get my name back on the radio.”

“That album was written with Bernie last year,” he said. “In my opinion there is not a single bad song on that album. I love all the songs. It was a lot of fun to write.”

He’s scheduled to open for Mitchell Tenpenny alongside John Langston on June 16th in Bay City, and will be performing these songs in the area soon. He previously performed at the 2022 Bay Country Music Festival, back-to-back opening acts for Chris Cagle and Grammy Award winner Travis Tritt.

Hanel says he always thinks of everything that could go wrong before a performance like this, but at the end of the day, once you’ve done it, you can work on it.

“Who cares if that happens?” said Hanel. “Some of the people at these shows came to see me. Thinking about it in my head gave me a little confidence. or dropped my hat, but none of that.” “

This summer, Hannell will open for Grammy winner Ashley McBride at the Ionia County Fair on July 22nd and Grammy nominee Joe Dee Messina at Birch Run Speedway on September 16th. It is scheduled to serve as the opening act for , and it can be seen that performances will be performed throughout Michigan.

Waylon Hanel can be found online at the website waylonhanel.com, as well as on Facebook and Instagram @waylon_hanel_music.