Darlene L'Archeveque, a Francophone Canadian, was born in Montreal, Quebec during 'The Quiet Revolution' of the 1960's. In 1973, three years after the FLQ crisis, she was uprooted at the age of seven by her Anglophone mother and moved, along with her brother, to Calgary, Alberta.
Stripped from her culture, Darlene's identity was erased overnight by her mother, who unilaterally shut the door on matters of the past, and by her new classmates, most of whom condemned her francophone roots and labelled her a 'frog.'
Political strife perpetuated the cycle of alienation and prejudice against those who had migrated to Alberta from Eastern Canada. Darlene was targeted band beaten by those who believed in the 'redneck' philosophy.
On the flipside, her home life was equally tumultuous. Darlene knew that her home was broken and that her mother was mentally unstable and prone to violent outbursts. Poverty and the stigma of welfare created one crisis after another. After being swept into the riptide and pulled under by the turbulent waves of circumstances, Darlene embarked on a musical journey of survial. She was nine years old; the year was 1975.
With popular music at the helm, Darlen was empowered to rewrite her own life story. She cast recording artists whom she had never met into critical roles alongside her in the trenches of her life.
In this alternate world music was Darlene's surrogate family. Unbeknownst to those whom she cast, they carried her young heart and soul through a musical and spiritual journey of healing and self-discovery, she never expected that one day her journey would bring them together.
Darlene L'Archeveque, a Francophone Canadian, was born in Montreal, Quebec during 'The Quiet Revolution' of the 1960's. In 1973, three years after the FLQ crisis, she was uprooted at the age of seven by her Anglophone mother and moved, along with her brother, to Calgary, Alberta.
Stripped from her culture, Darlene's identity was erased overnight by her mother, who unilaterally shut the door on matters of the past, and by her new classmates, most of whom condemned her francophone roots and labelled her a 'frog.'
Political strife perpetuated the cycle of alienation and prejudice against those who had migrated to Alberta from Eastern Canada. Darlene was targeted band beaten by those who believed in the 'redneck' philosophy.
On the flipside, her home life was equally tumultuous. Darlene knew that her home was broken and that her mother was mentally unstable and prone to violent outbursts. Poverty and the stigma of welfare created one crisis after another. After being swept into the riptide and pulled under by the turbulent waves of circumstances, Darlene embarked on a musical journey of survial. She was nine years old; the year was 1975.
With popular music at the helm, Darlen was empowered to rewrite her own life story. She cast recording artists whom she had never met into critical roles alongside her in the trenches of her life.
In this alternate world music was Darlene's surrogate family. Unbeknownst to those whom she cast, they carried her young heart and soul through a musical and spiritual journey of healing and self-discovery, she never expected that one day her journey would bring them together.
