The Nashville-based Arkansas Country Music Award nominee is the definition of "Grit"
Independent Women’s Forum is pleased to announce that Alexis Wilkins—an up-and-coming country music artist whose new single, “Grit,” celebrates fortitude and gumption—is the latest entry in our popular series of Champion Women profiles.
Alexis, 24, an Arkansas Country Music Awards nominee for Female Vocalist of the Year, is based in Nashville. “I’d always had the title ‘Grit’ in mind, and I loved it because I love John Wayne and I love just the whole idea of the gritty cowboys he played. They stood for something. Grit is something that we’re lacking now.”
Alexis is an out-of-the-closet conservative, who writes for such outlets as The Daily Caller, Townhall, and Turning Point USA, and is about to launch a show with PragerU. Her previous hit, “Stand,” which rose to number ten on the C&W charts, was released last year in time to coincide with Veterans Day. Wilkins works with Warrior Rounds, Operation Standdown, and Soldier’s Child and performs in veterans’ hospitals through the Musicians on Call program. With the controversy over Jason Aldean’s “Try That in a Small Town” rocking country music and the world beyond, IWF asks Wilkins to comment.
“It certainly is an interesting time for country music,” she replies, “and I think that we’ve been building up to this point where people, whether political or not, but who are just plainly patriotic, are growing tired of being silenced for their views. I think Jason Aldean’s song is great. I know the group of people who wrote it too, and I know what they believe; they are patriotic, and representative of small-town values in the best way. I hate to see something get misconstrued, but it’s a healthy conversation within country music, and honestly in the country in general.”
Still, she acknowledges that country music is at a crossroads. “Country has always been a space for truth, and for people to tell stories that matter,” Alexis says. “I want to do my part to keep patriotism alive in country music.”
We know you will enjoy meeting this thoughtful and talented young woman who has some intriguing thoughts on her own generation.
