Mélissa Laveaux

Mélissa Laveaux emerged in the mid-2000s with music characterized by an eclectic mix of folk-pop, rock, and blues, with nods to her Haitian heritage. She was born in Montreal to Haitian parents, but grew up in Ottawa. In 2006 she recorded and self-produced her debut record, Camphor & Copper, a multilinguistic work that put her fluid guitar playing and rich voice out front. Alongside original compositions, the album included covers of Elliot Smith’s “Needle in the Hay” and Eartha kitt’s “I Want to Be Evil.”

In the wake of the record’s release she moved to France where, in 2007, she won Lagardère Talent foundation’s musician bursary. She used the award to re-record and mix her debut, which was released by the French label No Format! in 2008. The following year, Laveaux put out a cover version of Beyonce’s “Crazy in Love,” but it wouldn’t be until 2013 that her sophomore full-length effort appeared. The title of the record, Dying is a wild night, riffed on an Emily Dickinson quote, and much like her debut, it embraced a multitude of styles, genres, and tropical cadences.

In 2016, she traveled to Haiti, her parents’ birthplace, for the first time in 20 years. As Laveaux immersed herself in the history and culture of the country, the seeds of her third full-length were sown. Comprised of traditional folk songs, voodoo spirituals, and her original composition “Jolibwa,” Radyo Siwèl was released in 2018.