Les Chanterelles summon strength through song for a New Beginning
CBC Communications | Posted: March 26, 2021 8:03 PM | Last Updated: April 8, 2021
Fredericton-based chanteuses draw the curtain on 2021 edition of The Story and the Song
Fredericton vocal trio Les Chanterelles wrote their track for The Story and the Song on the theme of Rebirth. And it is truly a story of Rebirth, borne out of a tragedy suffered by Justine Everett, and the birth of a new child to Juanita Bourque.
Juanita Bourque gave birth to a son just prior to the onset of the pandemic. It's not lost on Bourque, or her bandmates, that he will grow up only knowing life in a post-pandemic world.
For singer Justine Everett, it is a story written between the loss of one pregnancy and the beginning of another – written on her journey between grief and hope.
Justine suffered a miscarriage in April 2020, just as the pandemic became real. A difficult time under any circumstances, it was especially so when hospital regulations around COVID-19 forced her to go through it alone.
Along with her husband, she retreated to a quiet place on the ocean for recovery. They didn't speak much – they wrote in journals and took long walks on the beach. It was on one of those walks that she looked out over the sea to the horizon, and understood this was only the beginning of a beautiful journey, and new hope was planted on that beach.
Now Justine is pregnant again. And the exact phrase that opens the song came to her the moment she heard the heartbeat of her new unborn baby.
I'm trading my loss for a blessing. This journey's been hard, but I'll summon the strength. To meet you this summer in a new world. A new beginning for me, a new beginning for you. - Les Chanterelles
It's a gorgeous song ... it begins softly with Justine's achingly tender vocal over a quietly strummed guitar. The lyrics are haunting, but offer hope for a new beginning – a Rebirth
Joining Les Chanterelles on the Story and the Song - Rebirth are: Jah'Mila, Wolf Castle, Jenn Grant, Mary Beth Carty, Meaghan Blanchard and Paul Murphy.