Avery Anna’s Rise: From Bathtub TikTok to ACM New Female Artist of the Year

On April 28, Avery Anna — the 22-year-old from Flagstaff, Arizona — was officially named the Academy of Country Music’s New Female Artist of the Year. It’s the kind of recognition that lands with a particular thud in country circles: this category has been a launchpad for the big ones, and this year’s win places her in the company of Shania Twain, Carrie Underwood and Taylor Swift. The ACM telecast itself arrives May 17, with Shania set to host, and the timing feels both ceremonial and inevitable.

What makes Avery Anna’s story compelling isn’t just that she’s young or that she writes songs; it’s the way a few viral seconds, a stack of self-penned tracks, and some old-school hustle braided together. If you remember the bathtub clip — October 2020, her in a tub singing A Great Big World and Christina Aguilera’s “Say Something” — you remember the moment millions of strangers realized she had something. The TikTok pulled 10 million views and caught the attention of Matt Thomas from Parmalee and producer-manager David Fanning. Within months she had management, within a year she’d moved to Nashville, and by June 2022 she’d signed with Warner Music Nashville.

Why fans care

There’s a pedigree to this ACM category. The artist who wins New Female Artist often becomes shorthand for a career trajectory: look back and you’ll find names who reshaped country radio. This year’s nominees — Megan Moroney, Miranda Lambert, Ella Langley and Lainey Wilson — are all past winners, which only underscores how seriously fans and the industry take the title. Avery Anna stepping into that lineage feels less like flash-in-the-pan hype and more like a deliberate introduction.

Her records, and how she writes

She’s released two full-length albums for Warner Music Nashville, Breakup Over Breakfast and Let Go Letters, plus the EPs Mood Swings and forgive, forget. On Breakup Over Breakfast she’s a co-writer on all 17 tracks — real songwriting credits across an entire record — and the album features collaborations with names that mean something in modern country: Parmalee, Dylan Marlowe, Hillary Lindsey, Liz Rose and Lori McKenna. That list reads like a learning curve as much as a credits page; she’s clearly been steeping herself in craft while also finding collaborators who open doors.

Beyond her own releases, she co-wrote and appears on Sam Barber’s “Indigo,” which hit No. 8 on Billboard’s Hot Country Songs and crossed into the Hot 100 at No. 40. And onstage experience isn’t theoretical: she’s opened for Josh Turner, Parmalee and Martina McBride — each a different kind of audience education.

A mix of influences

Avery Anna’s taste couldn’t be pinned to a single corner of the radio dial. She tells the story of singing with her grandfather to Willie Nelson and Johnny Cash records, which is where the love of country was planted. Later she gravitated toward contemporary voices — Carrie Underwood, Miranda Lambert, Kelsea Ballerini — but she also admits to listening to Cage the Elephant, Noah Kahan and YEBBA. There’s a through-line: an appetite for strong melodies and emotional clarity, whether it’s vintage twang or indie-leaning phrasing.

The little things that mattered

Her path is full of specific moments that look accidental until you map them. She graduated high school in May 2021 via Zoom, moved to Nashville three months later at 17, and by September 2022 she’d made her Grand Ole Opry debut — a rite of passage in country music that still registers as weighty. That bathtub TikTok was a catalyst, yes, but the decisions after it — moving cities, getting into rooms with producers and songwriters, touring as an opener — are what turned a viral moment into a career scaffold.

A pop culture pinprick: Kelly Clarkson

Then there’s the Kelly Clarkson moment. Clarkson covered Avery Anna’s “Narcissist” during a Kellyoke segment, and Anna’s reaction was pure fandom. “I was so in shock and so awestruck,” she said, remembering watching Clarkson’s “Piece by Piece” performances on repeat as a kid. It’s a small thing on paper, but for a young songwriter seeing an artist she admired take her song — that’s validation that travels.

So where does this leave her now? The ACM win is a marker more than a finish line. Fans will point to the songwriting credits, to the collaborations and to the voice she brings into rooms. They’ll also point to a career built on a mix of social moments and steady industry moves — the kind of balance many newer artists are attempting but few execute so cleanly.

For people in the crowd at smaller venues or streaming her records on a Saturday morning, Avery Anna’s rise feels immediate and relatable: a kid who sang with her grandpa, learned to write in a journal, went viral from a bathtub and then, slowly and stubbornly, made the move into the world she’d been listening to all her life. That arc is part of the appeal. There’s work to come, but for now the moment is hers — and fans are on board to see what she does next.