Need help? Call Britney. The pop superstar has been working overtime to help others lately, working a charity basketball game, a math tutoring campaign and several other causes into her busy schedule. So maybe it should come as no surprise that she’s formed her own production company to help new artists climb their way up the music-business ladder.
Kristy Lee, a 17-year-old country singer from Selma, Oregon, is the as-yet-untitled production company’s first client, according to Lee’s Arista Nashville publicist.
“Britney has a great desire to discover and help promote other young talent,” Spears’ manager, Larry Rudolph, said in a statement released by Arista Nashville. “Britney fell in love with Kristy’s voice the first time she heard it.”
Spears, who met Lee through Rudolph, Lee’s lawyer, will make a cameo in Lee’s first video, due next year. Spears’ spokesperson did not return phone calls.
Lee is managed by Marty Rendleman, the woman who discovered and managed LeAnn Rimes for three years. The up-and-coming singer’s debut album is tentatively due next spring.
Spears is not the first pop star to sign a teen country singer. Last year, ‘NSYNC’s Lance Bass nabbed 16-year-old Meredith Edwards for his Free Lance Entertainment. Bass’ mass appeal helped generate attention to Edwards, whose single, “The Bird Song,” is #47 on the Billboard Hot Country Singles & Tracks chart.
In between recording sessions for her next album, Spears has lent a helping hand to everyone from the pope to NASCAR to the MathNMusic Club.
