Heart-FM's Oxford's Got Talent is a Theatre Woodstock Fundraiser focusing on the great talent in our county. On Monday March 17th we held 10 hours of auditions and three preliminary judges (Jennifer Paquette, Betty Ford, and Richelle Brown) chose 20 acts and 4 wild card acts to perform on our Thursday and Friday night semi finals. The wild card acts didn't know they were performing until the evening of the show. From the semi-finalist acts the judges (Jennifer Paquette, Dan Henry from Heart-FM, and Charles Baxter) selected 13 acts to perform during the finals on Saturday night, March 22nd. The suspense really grew due to the fact that no one except the judging panel knew who would perform on Saturday night. It was to be announced at the top of the show!
Those who were chosen to perform didn't show their nerves. It was a full night of extremely talented people. At the end of the night 15-year-old Cameron Hawes took home the first place cheque of $1,000. Cameron gave a beautiful and moving performance, playing a Stevie Ray Vaughan-inspired blues song on his guitar. The $500 second place prize went to Sarajane Sweetland who performed a very entertaining and flawless clog, jig and reel step dance, and third place went to the magic act of John Poole. The judges called it a "very polished act". Rounding out fourth and fifth place was singer Samantha Shanks and Comedian/Impressionist Evan Marsh. Finals judges were Jen Paquette, Dan Henry, Vicki St. Pierre and Ron Cameron-Lewis.
Cameron Hawes playing 'Lennie' by Stevie Ray Vaughan.
Release dated: 24 March 2008
