Jennie Harluk’s family doesn’t remember a time in her young life when she wasn’t belting out tunes.
“She just always sang,” Harluk’s mom, Shauna, recalled with a smile. “We picked up pretty early that she had a bigger voice than we thought a five-year-old should have.”
“It’s been with me forever,” echoed the singer-songwriter – and Springbank Middle School student. “Literally, forever.”
The talented teenager comes by her abilities naturally. In Grade 3, she sang background vocals on a song her father Shane – a well-known performer in his own right – wrote for his wife.
It ignited a spark in the young musician, and she’s been singing and performing ever since. In 2011, she won the Strathmore Stampede talent search, and took home top prize at the Big Valley Jamboree showcase the following year. She was also a Young Canadian in 2014 and performed at the Calgary Stampede.
“She likes to compete, but she mostly just likes to perform,” said Shauna.
Harluk released her first single, Suitcase, in January, and it gets airtime on 88.1 FM Parkland County’s country station. Her second, Kissing Tree, is burning up the charts on Internet radio. She wrote the lyrics to both songs herself, after taking inspiration from a friend’s true story – and a tree in her neighbourhood with a bunch of initials carved into it.
Though Faith Hill and Carrie Underwood have been great influences, Harluk’s biggest champion has been her dad – who helped her produce and record her first two songs.
“It’s probably the strongest thing that we have,” said the teen. “It’s nice to have something like that. If I need help, he’s always there.”
With that kind of unwavering support, Harluk has started to come into her own, landing on a sound that blends her traditional love of country with an emerging affection for alternative folk.
She’s recording two more singles that she wrote this year, and expects her first full-length record will be ready for release early in 2017.
Harluk will perform next at the Springbank Heritage Club on Oct. 26, and she and her dad also host a family-friendly musicians’ evening called Country Night Live in Calgary, with the next one taking place in February.
Finally, she hopes to perform as part of the upcoming Rotary Club Youth Talent Festival in Cochrane in November.
“For the rest of my life I’ll do something with music,” she said. “I know it will always be a part of whatever I do.”
