Janelle Lucyk

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​"Such an angelic voice. Her expressiveness is beyond words. It's as though she's channeling God." - (YouTube)

 

Janelle Lucyk is a leader among an emerging generation of Canadian artists specializing in old music and historically informed performance, taking ideas from conception to the stage.

 

Janelle is the artistic director of Ménestrel, her ensemble with Kerry Bursey which produces alternative early music mixing ancient repertoire with oral folk traditons. In 2022 and 2023, Ménestrel produced their "Messiah-on-the-go!" congregating twenty emerging performers from across Canada to perform Handel's masterpiece in historic Nova Scotian venues. Janelle is director of the new series ArtChoral at La Grande Salle du 9e, the recently reopened historic Art Deco venue in Montreal.  Following mentor and arts champion Barbara Butler, Janelle is Artistic and Administrative Director of Musique Royale (est. 1985), a music presenter based in Lunenburg, Nova Scotia which enriches historic spaces through the sharing of world class early music, and much more.  Last year included concerts in forty different historic venues across the spectacular maritime province.

 

2024 includes touring in most of the provinces and territories of Canada as a soloist representing ArtChoral's multiyear project Coast-to-Coast-Coast. Through the summer Ménestrel was in residency in Europe for concerts, recording and outreach.

 

In fall 2022, Janelle was invited by legendary organist Xaver Varnus to perform at his two sold out performances in Hungary, including at the spectacular Bartók National Concert Hall in Budapest. She has had the good fortune of working as a soloist with the Kings College Chapel Choir under five-time Grammy winner Paul Halley on many unforgettable concerts including Monteverdi’s Vespers of 1610 and Selva Morale e Spirituale and multiple Bach Passions.  Janelle graduated in 2014 with distinction from the Conservatoire Royal de Bruxelles in Belgium and completed her Masters in Management at Durham University in the UK where she was awarded the Best Soloist by Music Durham, and Best Female Soloist by her peers. While in Europe, she formed Voces Desuper, an ensemble performing regularly in the magnificent Cathédrale de Saints-Michel-et-Gudule, and especially at the Te Deum ceremony for the King and Queen of Belgium.

 

Janelle is ever grateful to the Canada Council of the Arts, the Federal Department of Canadian Heritage, Conseil des arts et des lettres du Québec, Arts Nova Scotia and Brent Rinaldi for their support.