As we are getting ready to turn our calendars and ears to a new year of new great music, there are a handful of new artists who have already proved this year they will be well worth following-up closely in 2011! Here’s our end-of-the-year new artist round-up highlights:

Easton Corbin capped off a great year among a promising group of new Nashville artists, taking home three Breakthrough Artist trophies from the premier airing of the American Country Awards on December 6. With a banner run that includes a Billboard Hot Country® Songs number one placement for his first single release, “A Little More Country Than That“, the introduction of his self-titled debut album , and a second single, “Roll With It“, topping the country music charts, Corbin’s 2010 has definitely been striking gold.

Meanwhile, The Band Perry also had a stellar year. The release of their first album, plus a dazzling debut for their hit single, “If I Die Young,” which claimed the catbird seat at #1 on the country charts and received a Grammy nomination for Song of the Year, mean that Kimberly, Reid and Neil of the Band Perry are riding high on the tail end of 2010, and enjoying every minute of it. Says Kim, “our very favorite thing to do is to just go out on stage every night with country music lovers and to sing country songs together.”

Not to be outdone, Steel Magnolia, a duo comprised of real-life sweethearts Meghan Linsey and Joshua Scott Jones, received the coveted nomination of Top New Vocal Duo from the Academy of Country Music Awards in 2010 as well as a nomination in the same category from the Country Music Association Awards, along with the CMT Music Awards nomination for Duo Video of the Year for Steel Magnolia’s hit single “Keep on Lovin’ You.”

Other notable new country artists enjoying major accomplishments in 2010 include Jerrod Niemann, whose 2010 debut single entitled “Lover, Lover “, a cover Sonia Dada‘s “You Don’t Treat Me No Good,” reached number one on the country music charts in August, and Justin Moore, whose singles “Backwoods” climbed to the sixth rung on the Top Ten ladder, and “How I Got to Be This Way” made the top 20. Popular new artist  Sunny Sweeney released her first single in June of 2010, entitled “From a Table Away,” which rocketed smack dab into Billboard’s Hot Country® Song chart.

We are sure to hear and see more from all of them in the coming year, and from some of them sooner than later: Steel Magnolia is scheduled to release their first full-size album on Januray 11, 2011. When we last spoke with Meghan and Scott, they mentioned that “Good things have always happen to them with number “11″”, thus the release date was set based on their favorite number.  We can be quite sure many more good things will happen with them….with number “11″ or not!