I Wanna Be A Rock Star and Stuff

RockerGirl Camp is for girls who wanna rock. But 10-year-old Hannah Karvonen Parsons wasn't sure about going. “I was afraid that everyone was gonna be older than me and that I wouldn't know anyone.” Her mom, Ava, insisted though, and once Hannah made a new friend and started learning how to play the electric guitar and the drums, she changed her mind.

At the end of day 2, Hannah sat down and played a drum riff for her mom. Ava smiles as she tells the story. "She was like, 'Hey mom, check this out.' Ta dum, ta dum, thunk. And I'm like, 'Wow, that’s you doing that?' This is a kid who’s never played the drums in her life before."

As part of the camp, all the girls form bands (Hannah's band last year was the Atomic Blue Jeans) and write songs to perform in the concert at the end of the week. How do they come up with an original piece of music in 5 days? According to Hannah, "We sat together ... we'd make up random stuff and then we'd show them to each other and we'd circle the parts we liked and then we'd put them together."

Ava tells the story of their concert: "And then she opened the concert on Friday with 'Edmonton, are you ready to rock!' And she had her drumsticks in the air and she goes 'One, Two. One, Two, Three, Four.' And I’m like, 'Wow, where did you learn that?' And she says 'Well mom, dad took me to see Avril Lavigne. That's what she did when she opened in Edmonton.'

Hannah's favourite part of RockerGirl Camp was performing at the end, "cause you’d have all this fun and stuff.” She admits to feeling “sorta nervous,” but then says, “I was like, I can do this, like I practiced so much and everything.”

This year, Hannah's working on convincing her cousin to come to the camp with her. Dreaming about the future and starting her own band, Hannah confesses, “Yeah, I wanna be a rockstar and stuff.”

Where Next?

Hannah Karvonen

Photo of Hannah Karvonen Parson

Hannah Karvonen Parsons loves music and started writing songs when she was in grade 2. She sings in Cantilon Choirs' Children's Choir, Western Canada's only professional level children's choir. Even though the choir doesn't exactly sing rock music, Hannah still likes it: "It’s sorta good tunes and stuff."

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