Drumheller country crooner Jaydee Bixby, 24, has a fresh start with a new Memphis - based record label.

    
    Drumheller’s Jaydee Bixby is taking his musical career south of the border, and is packing along a catalogue of music for his new audience.
    In January, Bixby signed a new record deal with Mid South Music Records based out of Memphis Tennessee.  He relocated to Winnipeg last October with new management and he is looking south of the border to ignite his career.
    “Basically down in the States they don’t know Canadian Idol, none of that was ever shown on television, so I am being shopped around down there like I am starting from the beginning,” he tells inSide Drumheller.
    While he says he cherishes his experience on Idol and the career he has built north of the 49, he is looking forward to his new direction.
    “I find it is nice to have an opportunity to say I can do it on my own without the help of a television show. Never would I say the time on Canadian Idol pigeonholed me because it got me on the fast rack to a career in Canada,” he said.  
    It looks like his new direction will be put right on the road.
      “I am really excited about some of the stuff coming up. My new record company has me all over the United States and Europe and Australia. They are going to be keeping me busy, keeping me off the continent,” he chuckles.
   In the mean time, he is busy writing every day.
       Bixby’s first album, “Cowboys and Cadillacs” came out in 2008. He followed it up with “Easy to Love” in 2010 and then “Work in Progress” in 2013. All of this could be rediscovered by a new audience.
   “We are taking the best tracks, and the songs I feel most strongly about…we are going to pick a few from each CD and also going to add a couple I have written and see where it goes. In Canada it could be a “best of” because it has been released and known here since Canadian Idol, but in the States it is starting fresh.”
   Going through his catalogue, while many songs are only a few years old, he feels they are out of date.
    “Some of them I can’t sing, now that I am 24, so it is good to leave them where they are,” he said.
    He adds that in some cases the opposite is true and some of his old songs that weren’t well received a couple years ago are now in fashion.
    “They were a little too “rocky” and not as country. That was a few years ago, and now that’s all there is in the radio, so they were released a few years too early,” he said.
     “I am looking forward to an exciting 2015.”

 A woman discovered with marijuana in a parking lot at the Drumheller Institution was given an absolute discharge.
    Stephanie Scholfield appeared in provincial court on Friday, February 20. She pleaded guilty to possession of marijuana.
    The court heard how on September 12, 2014 Schofield was at the Drumheller Institution, outside the gate in a parking lot, when officers were alerted to activity. A search of her car revealed approximately 3 grams of marijuana. Scholfield insisted that she was not smoking.
    She told the court she was with a friend who was visiting her boyfriend at the institution. Her intention was a simple visit to the valley. She said she had no intention of bringing the marijuana into the institution.
    Judge Fraser queried as to whether Alternative Measures were available to the accused. The Federal Prosecutor explained that because of a previous record, not related to drugs, the option was not available.
    Judge Fraser granted Scholfield an absolute discharge. The marijuana was forfeited.