A member of a musical duo with local roots says she's honoured by an international songwriting award.

Madison Violet won the Maxell Song of the Year in the John Lennon songwriting contest for the song The Ransom.

The group is made up of Cregnish's Lisa MacIsaac and Brenley MacEachern.

MacEachern's family comes from Inverness Co.

MacIsaac tells The Hawk they wrote the award-winning song during a low point on the road.

"We were just exhausted. The tour was too long, we were a bit road weary and we just both wanted to go home,” she says.

“That doesn’t happen too often, we are usually quite content on the road,” she says.

“But I think it just hit us that we had enough right at that moment and it inspired this song."

Macisaac says there were thousands of entries from across the world.

She says some big names in the music industry were judges for the contest.

"The people who have listened to this song now are Elton John, Tim McGraw, Fergie, Mary J. Blige,” she says.

“Who knows maybe something fantastic will come of this."

They won $20,000, plus other prizes.