How Cloe Terare went from quitting music to hottest 100 selection

She’s a proud Indigenous woman with a natural talent for singing and songwriting. Now the Toowoomba woman has been recognised with one of the biggest honours in Australian music. Details here.

As a young girl Cloe Terare looks back fondly on the moments spent with her grandfather Garth Terare – a respected country musician – who introduced her to the art of singing and songwriting.

But when Cloe was a young teen and her grandfather passed away, her entire world came crashing down.

“I completely stopped and quit music – I just felt I couldn’t do it anymore (without him),” she said.

“My grandad was my biggest influence, my first manager and my biggest fan … he’s the person who put me on stage for the first time and we released my first album together.”

Unable to stay away from her greatest passion, the talented Toowoomba musician began singing again in 2019.

In 2022, Terare was awarded the $10,000 Billy Thorpe Scholarship at the 2022 Queensland Music Awards and gained notoriety as one of the country’s most promising musicians to watch.

Toowoomba singer songwriter Cloe Terare.

It was Cadillac – a song she wrote as a heartfelt tribute to her late grandfather, which cemented her as a Triple-J Unearthed artist and placed her in the running for the station’s Hottest 100 Countdown.

“My grandfather was a proud Indigenous man, he had a Cadillac and it has a bit of a country vibe to it, so it’s a bit of a nod to where we’ve come from and our roots,” she said.

“He loved the spotlight and would have wanted to share it with me, so if he was here today, we would have been thriving together.”

The artist said being selected for the Triple-J voting shortlist was “mind-blowing” and a dream she always wanted to achieve.

2022 Queensland Music Awards Billy Thorpe Scholarship Winner Cloe Terare.

“Representation of Indigenous people in the music industry is growing,” she said.

“Our strong community really works together to help each other and create for ourselves in the industry.

The 26-year-old musician thanked the public for their support.

“It would be a dream come true to have Toowoomba on the Hottest 100 Countdown,” she said.

Voting closes at 12pm on Monday, January 23 at hottest100.abc.net.au