A silver lining for Jadel

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For many local entertainers the emergence of COVID-19 weighed like a wet blanket on their career, however, for Jardine “Jadel” Cherelle Legere it was the silver lining to her cloud.

The upcoming entertainer with guidance from her management team took that time to identify where she is going, explore her competence and land the right song to win the favour of being featured on the BET and MTV channels.

Jadel became known in many households as and earned a spot on the soca monarch stage in 2018 with the soca song Round N Round. Her eight-year stint in the industry has also earned her airtime on international platforms, with the song Deserve it All; an anthem to woman power.

She believes she has grown as a person and has more virtues to be thankful for when she became a mother.

“When COVID happened, my management advised me to use this as an opportunity to be myself, to highlight my vocals without facing judgment or fear of not having it accepted…When my music video for Deserve It All was released, my manager Julian Hackett of JP Music Group handled the digital distribution, they believed the quality was strong enough to be pitched to MTV base and it was instantly accepted and was very popular within South Africa.

A few months later a representative from BET/Viacom was interested in having us pitch this music video to BET Jams and MTV within the USA, and it all worked out. It was an amazing experience seeing my video on a network like this.”

Humbled by the experience, Jadel said she spends a lot of time with her three-year-old daughter, Kaylee, simply enjoying the innocent traits she sees of herself in the toddler. She said she is not one to plan her career way ahead but rather challenge herself to remain relevant and move with the trends of the industry.

Jadel said, “My daughter is always with me and no matter how hard being a mother gets, I would never want this to ever end.

“It has been a wonderful experience watching her grow and take on some of the traits that I’ve never taught her… I try not to think too far into the future and focus on now and the following year. Music changes so fast, how people absorb music changes year by year. My short-term goal as an artist is to get as much exposure as possible to help build myself among the elites in soca music.”

And despite accepting the pros of the ongoing pandemic, Jadel also cashes in on the cons as it pertains to career.

“Musically for me, COVID was a blessing in disguise, financially it was terrible though because the ability to perform and travel was limited. Financially, it was hard to really do the projects that I really wanted to do. It’s incredibly challenging to make inroads into the industry, music not only is expensive to do, but it’s hard without a proper support team. Before I used to do everything on my own, reaching out to producers, to writers for advice on my writing, to designers for artwork and videos, to radio stations to ensure they received my releases as well as handling my own bookings. It can be very draining, but I believe it’s all a part of the process of building yourself. Finding the right people to be around you and finding the right support system that allows you to be free creatively and ease the stresses of the industry,” she said.

Jadel who hails from Westmoorings felt COVID made her more creative. “I personally feel COVID didn’t set back the art form, if anything it allowed us, artists, to be more creative, carry less pressure and you don’t have to adhere to rapid musical deadlines. For me, before COVID I would find myself being forced and boxed in creatively to make songs for carnival. Advice given to me was to make ‘wining songs’ and make something to ‘mash up’ the road. But I began to realise that as soon carnival was done, that’s it. Most songs stopped playing and it was the music with open-ended topics that lasted the longest and became classics.”

Jadel is versatile in her standing as an artist and does not limit herself to the many genres she can sing; she dabbles in R&B, Soca, Electro Pop, and Afro Pop.

Other content to Jadel repertoire includes Yuh Man, Up in d Party, Spice It Up, and, power soca Jam Day.

She said her first single is expected in May and to be followed up with the release of a second album based on content and the right timing.