ANNETTE DUCHARME is all charm! The accomplished Diamond award-winning Franco-Ontarian pop and rock singer-songwriter, guitarist and composer, originally from Windsor, has called Vancouver home since the 1980s.
After years of cross-country touring and recording seven albums, originally with the Bowers-Ducharme duo and later performing solo works with backup, in 2011, Annette decided to focus on extended voice training. Working with coaches that include internationally renowned soprano Heidi Klassen and intuitive voice teacher Richard Williams, Annette realized she had “this other voice in me,” which turned out to be in the coloratura soprano range.
Formerly a “natural” singer, she says her voice “has grown” through her current performances as Lady Macbeth (Macbeth) and Violetta (La Traviata) with Canada’s only repertory opera company, Opera Pro Cantanti, based in Vancouver.
“I’m letting the music speak through me,” she says, explaining that in her operatic role she now feels quite “at home.” But she still finds time to write songs. After all, one of her early pieces, “Sinking Like a Sunset,” became one of Canadian Tom Cochrane’s hit singles.
For more opera information: www.procantanti.com
MARY ANNE CHU has practised yoga for as long as she can remember. The former Vancouver kindergarten and primary ESL teacher enrolled in the 2008 inaugural Yoga Teacher Training programme at Langara College (now University). In 2015, she did further training through Langara’s Continuing Studies, focusing on Therapeutic Yoga for Trauma, Resilience and Emotional Well-Being.
With her formal certification, plus many years of her own Iyengar practice that included being on the BKS Iyengar Yoga Vancouver Association board, Mary Anne started teaching chair yoga to those over 65 at the Renfrew-Collingwood Seniors’ Centre in Vancouver. Once a week, for the past 12 years, she motivates participants, from 65 to 103, to gently move.
“They do what they can,” she says. “I talk them through it, taking into account their physical and medical limitations.”
Over the years, Mary Anne has built relationships with her community of “yogis” that come regularly to participate in their well-being.
“I love working with them, and it allows me to be with a group of multi-ethnic elders that I otherwise have little contact with since my Italian mother passed,” she adds.
Mary Anne also volunteered her skills with younger Downtown East Side women, supporting them in accessing the benefits of a yoga practice.
“It gave them the opportunity to experience their bodies in new ways,” she says of the experience. “They came because they felt it helped them. They were very thankful and usually left a bit happier.”
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