Congratulations are in order for singer-songwriter Jordan St. Cyr, who won the Juno Award for Best Contemporary Christian/Gospel Album of the Year for his self-titled album.
This year’s Juno Awards, which celebrate Canada’s top singers, musicians, songwriters, and producers, were held in Edmonton. Though St. Cyr wasn’t able to attend in person due to his touring schedule in the United States, he reports being thrilled with the honour.
A Stressful Year
After growing up and then making a home in Niverville with his wife Heather and their four kids, St. Cyr and his family moved to Nashville in 2022. Despite the challenges of making cross-border moving arrangements during the pandemic, St. Cyr knew it was the best choice to support his growing career.
“It was still the middle of the pandemic, but I felt the call to keep writing songs,” says St. Cyr. “Then one of my songs caught on in U.S. radio in 2020 and that got us started thinking about a move.”
It was 2022 when they finally had everything in place and the family found themselves settled in a small town northeast of Nashville called Murphysboro.
“We ended up in a great neighbourhood, but it probably took about five or six months to feel like we had done a good thing,” said St. Cyr.
Just when the family had fallen into a good routine, their youngest daughter, Emery, suffered a major health setback. The then-three-year-old suffers from a rare neurological disease called Sturge Weber Syndrome.
“I was on the road when Heather called me and told me about Emery’s seizures,” he says. “So we got a crash course in the U.S. healthcare system, which lasted from March to April 2022 until Emery was stable. It really was a challenging time.”
St. Cyr spent as much time with his family as he could during this period, but it took a toll on the family to have him gone so often.
“For me as a father who leaves the house for his work, and I’m gone four to five days at a time, well, it was Heather who got us through,” says St. Cyr. “She believes in me and this call to put the message out, even sometimes more than I believe, so it comes down to family. If family doesn’t work, nothing else does.”
St. Cyr’s mother stayed with them for a time and the family quickly bonded with their new friends and neighbours.
“Our new neighbours became our new best friends, our lifeline. We had a 911 call and they helped our family. It brought us together,” says St. Cyr. “Now, just over a year in, we feel settled.”
A Successful Year
Professionally, St. Cyr is busier than ever. The full-length Juno-winning album was released in the spring of 2022 under the Seattle-based label BEC Recordings. From the album, the standout songs “Fires” and “Weary Traveler” reached number five and number one on radio charts respectively. Both songs offer hope that even in dark moments God gives people strength.
It was “Fires” that hit airwaves first and played on major networks and stations for nearly 18 months, reaching millions of American listeners. But “Weary Traveler,” which followed, could end up surpassing it.
St. Cyr became a two-time GMA Dove Awards nominee in August 2022, being recognized for Best New Artist and for Short-Form Video of the Year. He then took home six GMA Canada Covenant Awards wins, adding to the five he already had, including Artist of the Year, Album and Male Vocalist of the Year, Best Pop Song, Live Music Artist, and AC Artist of the Year.
But it’s last month’s Juno win that St. Cyr described as a Canadian kid’s dream come true.
When he received news of the nomination, he quickly realized that he wouldn’t be able to attend due to his commitment to open for Colton Dixon, a fellow Christian artist who placed seventh on American Idol in 2012.
“I had so many messages from colleagues and peers in the industry saying I had to go to the Junos to see all the people there, all the huge Canadian artists like Justin Bieber and Avril Lavigne,” he says. “But I had already committed to the shows I was doing on this tour, so logistically it didn’t make sense. When I told the award committee that I wasn’t able to make it, I worried that it would affect them, that I wouldn’t maybe win the award if I wasn’t able to attend, but my integrity told me to honour my commitment to the tour and the people relying on me.”
When St. Cyr won the award in absentia, he was surprised.
“I remember signing autographs and shaking hands after a show and I picked up my phone and it had like 30 messages on it and I thought, ‘Oh, I think I won a Juno.’”
The win was also a full-circle moment for St. Cyr and his wife, whose first date was at a Juno Fest event in 2005 when the Canadian show was being produced in Winnipeg.
Family Inspiration
St. Cyr credits his wife and family for inspiring his songwriting. He wrote “Weary Traveler” at the height of the pandemic, and it has resonated with a lot of people.
“Some of us had lost loved ones and we were starting to lose hope,” he says. “We were losing our own lives as we’d known it because of this thing that was going around.”
St. Cyr explains that he was on the road and Heather was at home with their four kids keeping their routine going when the song came to him.
“She was in my head and in my heart when I wrote the song. I wanted her to be encouraged and be able to carry on. The verse that inspired the song was the one where Jesus is saying, ‘Come to me, all who are weary and heavy laden and I will comfort you.’ I realized it isn’t a promise for just today; it’s a promise for tomorrow.”
Unsurprisingly, the artist says he drew from real-life challenges to find inspiration.
“I think, honestly, the majority of the songs on the album are inspired by what we’ve gone through with our little girl—the valley of that, and the challenges that we walk through, and how our faith has blossomed because of it,” says St. Cyr. “We see a lot of the world, saying, ‘Because we hurt, it means God doesn’t exist.’ But Heather and I see that God has proven his help and his presence over and over again.”
Touring with Colton Dixon is the busiest schedule St. Cyr has ever had and he says the travel pressure is real, but the opportunity to bring music to so many people is rewarding.
“I say this every night when I chat with people after the show,” he says. “It feels like I’ve won and my dreams have come true. Yes, there’s pressure ‘cuz you’ve got a team that works for you and you want to be a part of providing an income for them, but I think that’s a good kind of pressure. When we do it for the right reasons and serve people well, then it’s okay.”
A Return to Canada?
St. Cyr’s gratitude extends to his many fans in the United States whose support has created the opportunity for him to make a living creating music full-time. That said, it seems that he would also love to be able to be back home in Canada.
“I do hope the Juno win opens the door a little bit to be honest,” he says. “If I were to dream again, it would definitely be to come home to Canada. I would do a full cross-country tour and pour back into the country that I’m from and encourage the country that has equipped me all the years before. It would be a huge bucket list to be able to do that.”
While the prairie native hasn’t lost any of the love he has for his home, one thing he is losing is his “prairie accent,” which he humbly admits is slowly being replaced by a southern drawl.
“I think to some degree I’ve always had it,” says St. Cyr with a laugh. “I’ve always been a lazy talker. I started doing shows in Niverville eight or nine years ago and some people told me even then I had a southern sound. It’s okay. I’m not going to deny it.”
St. Cyr’s new single, “Rescue,” is coming out on April 14. Find it on Apple Music and Spotify.
