GREENVILLE, S.C. — Every year that Bill Lowen qualifies for the Bassmaster Classic, picking his song is easy.
He lets his daughter choose it.
Other anglers pick a song with a heavy beat that will shake the arena when they ride in on their boats, like "Turn Down for What" for Aaron Martens or "Lose Yourself" for Skeet Reese.
But Bill Lowen will be riding in with the theme song of little girls everywhere, "Let It Go," the theme from Frozen.
"I turned in the song to the officials," said Lowen, "but then I thought, there's no way I can do that song. How the heck am I going to come in to that?"
But he didn't change it. Because 6-year-old Nevaeh (or Heaven spelled backward) wanted it.
"You know how they typically put a spotlight on the family when the angler comes in?," asked Lowen. "Well, that makes it worth it, seeing my kids excited to hear the song they picked playing."
Lowen told me this on the phone from the hotel room he's sharing with his wife, Jennifer, and their two kids, Nevaeh and Fisher, 3. In the background, Nevaeh was singing — guess what? — "Let It Go," and he told me her Frozen-themed blanket was on her bed.
"It's nice to have a little fun with it," he said. And fun it has been for the rest of us, as we have snickered during the previous Classic weigh-ins when he rode in to Katy Perry's "Roar" and Flo Rida's "Whistle," both of which he dedicated to young Nevaeh. (She chose "Whistle," he said, because she liked it and because she once said, "I can't whistle, Daddy. My whistle's broke.")
"We spend 50,000 miles on the road together each year," said Lowen, "so I listen to a lot of stuff I probably wouldn't normally listen to."
This tradition will likely carry on to infinity, said Lowen. His daughter likes choosing the songs, and now that Fisher is getting older, he'll likely start chiming in, too.
The Frozen theme song will likely have even more meaning this year, thanks to the frigid temperatures.
And if Bill Lowen wins the Classic, and "the cold never bothered me anyway" line is blaring through the arena as the confetti is blowing all around him, you can bet that little girls everywhere will be happy to hear the song, and 6-year-old Nevaeh will be beaming with joy for the song — and for her dad.
