At 19, Bella Mackenzie is already making her mark on the Australian country music scene

When Bella Mackenzie was 12 years old, her family drove 200 kilometres into the beachside city of Mackay, Queensland, to see Lee Kernaghan in concert. As Kernaghan belted out his biggest hits in front of the roaring crowd, Bella decided what she wanted to be when she grew up: a country music star who could work a crowd just like the ‘Boys from the Bush’ singer.

“That’s when I realised I really loved country music and that I wanted to make my own,” she says. From that day on, Bella dedicated her spare time to learning her craft and developing her own sound, which she describes as “Carrie Underwood meets Chris Stapleton”.

Six years later, in 2023, all four celebrity judges turned their chairs around when Bella performed her rendition of Taylor Swift’s ‘Anti-Hero’ during The Voice blind auditions. She chose Guy Sebastian to be her mentor, hoping to soak up as much of his wisdom as she could while she was on the show.

“I knew straight away that I wanted to pick Guy,” she says. “I love his musicality and the way he’s super-collaborative with other artists.”

Australia was quick to fall in love with the now 19-year-old, as she belted out hit after hit each week, putting her unique spin on the songs Australia loves. She made it all the way to the semifinals, where she performed John Farnham’s ‘Two Strong Hearts’ in honour of her grandfather ‘Feno’ Mackenzie, who had passed away just before the episode aired.

“I was saying wherever you are, wherever I am, we’re two strong hearts and we’re still connected,” she explains. “He loved music, he loved Patsy Cline and Willie Nelson,” she continues. “He was someone who taught me that if you want something, work hard for it and you’ll get it.”

Ultimately, Sebastian decided to take another singer through to the finals, but Bella didn’t let this minor hiccup hold her back. In the year since, she’s become a bona fide country music star, signing with Island Records Australia and releasing her debut single ‘Cowboy’, which she describes as “an empowering song for people to put on in their car on the way to work”.

Her debut EP, Wild Thing, will be released on November 22 this year. “It’s a mix of sassy, fun, empowering and vulnerable,” Bella explains. “It’s a collection of my favourite songs that I’ve written over the past three to five years.”

This level of success is something that young Bella could only dream of while she was growing up next door to her family’s pub in Moranbah, a town in the heart of Queensland’s coal country with a population of around 9500.

“My dad and his brothers owned the Black Nugget Hotel in Moranbah, about a two-hour drive from Mackay. We grew up around the corner and ended up moving onto the premises,” Bella says. “When you own the pub in a one-pub town, everyone knows your family and there’s a strong sense of community.”

Bella grew up listening to her dad’s Bruce Springsteen collection and learning all the lyrics to Zac Brown Band songs, as her mum played them on repeat. But it was the live bands at the pub that helped Bella realise she might actually be able to make a living making music.

“We had live country music at the pub every single weekend, so we grew up listening to live music. My brother and I would text the band from the house and ask, ‘Can you play a Zach Bryan song?’ I think seeing the musicians doing what they love, entertaining people and making a living made me think, ‘Why can’t I do that?’”

An entertainer from the day she was born, Bella played her first gig at a local restaurant when she was 12 years old. “My brother was meant to DJ for them, but he was sick, so they asked whether I could play some songs. I got my little set list ready on my iPad, grabbed my guitar and performed for the diners. I was always the kind of kid who would say, ‘Hey, Mum — watch this!’ so I don’t think I was even nervous.”

When she’s not performing in front of crowds at local festivals, Bella splits her time between Mackay and her family’s property outside of Rockhampton. “We have about 40 head of cattle, so I go there and help with the mustering and other jobs around the farm,” she says. “I try to relax, but I’m such a go-go-go person.”

As for the future, Bella hopes this is just the beginning of a long career in the industry she loves.

“I want to make music that pumps people up when they listen to it as much as it pumps me up when I sing it,” she says. “I want to look out from a festival stage and see thousands of fists in the air, but I also want the little girls, like the ones I once was, listening on their headphones and feeling strong and like they can do anything they set their mind to.”

Don’t miss seeing Bella Mackenzie perform live, along with Riley Green, Cooper Alan, Josh Ross, Casey Barnes and Mackenzie Porter, at Ridin’ Hearts Festival 2024: Saturday, November 2, in Sydney and Sunday, November 3, in Melbourne. 

Tickets are now on sale at ridinhearts.com. Are you an up and coming performer? Ridin’ Hearts is on the hunt for the country’s most promising undiscovered artists and has launched Ridin’ Starts. With an incredible prize package on offer, go to ridinhearts.com for details on how to enter. Competition closes Friday, October 11.

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To hear more extraordinary stories about women living in rural and regional Australia, listen to our podcast Life on the Land on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and all major podcast platforms.