Baylee Turner, a 16-year student at Melfort and Unit Comprehensive Collegiate (MUCC), will be among the 80 Saskatchewan performers at Telemiracle 49.
This is her second performance at the event. She also performed at Telemiracle 39 in 2015.
“I performed when I was really little and I did musical theatre ‘Let it go’ from Frozen, so I’ve kind of already been on Telemiracle once. It’s really exciting to be going back this year,” she said.
Turner’s mother Stephanie Turner and sister Lucy Turner have also performed on Telemiracle in the past.
Baylee said performing on Telemiracle is a reflection on the values she grew up with.
“My family’s always been really involved in the community,” she said. “Even just in Melfort, I remember since I was really little going out and performing around the community. With Telemiracle, it’s something that is such a big event in Saskatchewan. It helps so many people, and so for us to get to be a part of that is really special.”
Turner will be performing an original song called ‘Remember Me’ live at Telemiracle. Turner said she only recently started song writing for the piano.
“I play piano, I sing, and this song that I wrote, I mean, I’m in Grade 11, so getting closer to graduating, and this song is about that and having to say goodbye and that bittersweet concept,” she said.
When she was little, Turner said she would make up songs with her sister and just did not have the piano ability to write the music to go with it. Once she improved her piano playing, she started writing words to go with the music.
Turner began song writing in the summer, and first performed at Spruce Haven Park in the summer. She is a self-taught piano player, who first began learning the instrument in elementary school.
“My family’s really musical, so it was always like a whole bunch of music, books and musical instruments and stuff,” she said. “We had a keyboard, and I found some of these beginner piano books and so I just started to teach myself piano for many years, and now I’m where I’m at today.”
Turner is looking forward to performing at Telemiracle for the second time.
“I am very excited,” she said. “I’ve been there before and my sister and my mom have been there too, and so they’re really supportive and really helpful because I know what to expect. I’m really excited to be performing live again and I really look forward to it.”
Turner, who set a fundraising goal of $1,500, is already well on her way to reaching it.
“It’s going really well,” she said. “I set kind of a high fundraising goal and I thought, ‘I might not even get close’ but it’s actually going pretty well. I’ve had a lot of donations, even from some family that aren’t even from Saskatchewan, who heard about it and are donating to Telemiracle, so that’s really awesome to see.”
Turner said Telemiracle is a very important event for Saskatchewan.
“I really love Telemiracle and I think that for us in Saskatchewan, having a relatively small population, it just goes to show like how many incredible people are here that donate so much of their time and their effort and funds to help others in the province. I think it’s even more impressive because we’re a pretty small population and I think that that’s something we should be really proud of.”
Telemiracle 49 is on March 1 and March 2 in Saskatoon.