Wanda Sparkes from Arborg and her General Store song are making waves among CFRY 920AM listeners.

If you haven't heard the tune, listen to, or know of the Wilf's Elie Ford General Store, the song is an ode to the program that has helped callers buy, sell, rent, trade, swap and give items away for decades.

Sparkes says that her inspiration came while driving to Saskatoon to visit her daughter, and the General Store just so happened to be on during the ride.

"It's a very long and boring drive, and I just got the idea to write a little song about it," she laughed. "I write lots of silly stuff and don't normally share it too much."

While the song has been a hit with listeners since its release, with requests daily for it to be played, Sparkes says she does produce better music with her family under the name the Fridfinnson Sisters.

Sparkes adds that her nephew Derek, who owns a music studio, helped clean up the background noise a little bit, but she did not record it in the studio, just a woman with a love for the store, an iPhone recorder app and a ukelele.

"This one I just did on my ukulele and phone and sent it into CFRY for a laugh," Sparkes continues. "I just recorded on my iPhone at home, which is pretty challenging; I have some very bad hand-eye coordination. So, the ukulele is all I can master, and I did my best and thought I'd send it in."

As far as the names that were dropped in the song, while funny, Sparkes says they are all fictional.

"I used some made-up names and a lot of real posts that you had online for items that were for sale. It's just made-up names and places to go with them." 

Hot on the heels of another successful radio amateur talent night from Amaranth this past weekend a fun fact is that Sparkes is a former winner. Along with her sisters, they won a talent show in 1977. Her mother Lillian played guitar and harmonized with them and Sparkes says music was the world to her mom, adding she was very sad when they decided they didn’t want to sing anymore. For her 65th birthday in 2002, they secretly made a cassette and surprised her with it. While her mother has passed on now, Sparkes says she would be tickled pink to know that her most stubborn singer now has a song on CFRY again.

The CFRY General store airs weekdays from around 1:10 p.m. to 1:30 p.m.