Singer and songwriter Hagiel’s very first memory is a dance. She was a little girl wrapped in her mother’s arms, swaying around the living room to whatever happened to be playing on the radio or the record player. That moment sparked a lifelong love affair with music, and it reaches its fullest expression yet with I Am Enough of a Woman, the Montreal singer’s debut EP, led by the soaring new single “Fight for Your Life,” out now.
Born in a small French village near Quebec City and now based in Montreal, the Canadian artist, also known as Analoga, blends blues, rock and gospel with her Caribbean and African roots and a generous dose of French-Canadian flair. Across six songs, she sings about survival, faith, heartbreak and freedom, in a voice shaped by years in one of Montreal’s most celebrated gospel choirs.
“Fight for Your Life,” co-written and produced by award-winning songwriter Mark Zubek, comes from the hardest stretch of her life. “The single was written after I was exhausted by all the hospital stays, and literally fighting for the life I wanted and the truth, after having a physical sickness, violence, and always being considered a mental case also,” Hagiel says. “I just wanted my freedom and to heal. I have been forced to stop all my projects many times, like music, video, film, and acting. I just found it unfair.”
The song turns that exhaustion into a rallying cry. “Fight for your life, the struggle is real,” she sings, before landing on one of the EP’s most hopeful lines: “And no, my dreams were never put on hold / They were only put on pause for a while.”
The title track goes back even further, to the end of a toxic relationship. “I wrote ‘I Am Enough of a Woman’ following the end of a toxic relationship in 2003. I don’t want any more violence in my life,” she says. “As I looked ahead as usual, I wrote down many lyrics at different hours of the day, in different places, even in hostels, through thick and thin, saying what was left of me. Trying to get my life back.”
The project almost carried a different name, until a songwriting teacher heard something special in one line. “The album and song ‘I Am Enough of a Woman’ was almost named ‘What’s Left of Me,'” Hagiel recalls. “I took private songwriting lessons with Marc Bélanger, who taught at the Prochant school in Montreal, which existed back in the day. He told me I just needed a few courses, and he said, ‘I am enough of a woman,’ mentioned in my song ‘What’s Left of Me,’ was so powerful. I decided to call the project that.”
Bélanger also nudged her toward an English-language songwriting mentor, and a simple online ad led her to Zubek, whose résumé includes work with Grammy winner Betty Carter and Crash Test Dummies. “He said I should find someone that writes in English to judge my songwriting,” she says. “I posted an ad on Craigslist looking for someone to review my grant application. Mark Zubek replied and offered his services as a producer. I sent him my material, and he thought I had potential. I got refused a few times for grants. Then eventually I got chosen, with Zubek’s help and guidance.”
Finding the right players to bring out the blues and gospel in her songs took time, and another ad. “After working with many musicians who were directing me away from what I wanted, I know who to include for my next recording to achieve that blues and gospel sound. Some songs are really bluesy, and some others were meant to be more gospel,” Hagiel says. “I posted an ad on a blues website, NetBlues, that is now not active. I found Pascal Gaudreau, and he helped me push ‘I Am Enough of a Woman’ and ‘Survivors’ further. I had the melody and a rough acoustic track recorded on my phone from a session with Marc Bélanger. He told me I don’t need to credit him, but I feel the need to mention him because he helped me believe in my songs and dreams.”
Gaudreau arranged both songs and played guitar and bass, with Mike Deschambeault on drums. “Survivors” has been with Hagiel a long time. Its demo took third place in Montreal’s YES Artistic Project Plan Contest back in 2010, and its chorus may be the EP’s thesis: “Survivors don’t need no medals / Just one last lap of struggles.”
Faith runs through the record too. The gospel stomper “Praise Your Way Out” was born in a hospital room. “I wrote it when I was in the hospital, after listening to Dr. Juanita Bynum’s testimony ‘I Don’t Mind Waiting’ on YouTube many times,” she says. “I could relate…”
The song, featuring backing vocals from Hagiel, Robert Peace and Zubek, reached the semi-finals of the 2024 Unsigned Only competition in the Christian category. It also made the semi-finals of the 2020 International Songwriting Competition, alongside “Turned Around Me,” a groove-filled love story about a red-headed “grooveman” who “could cast a spell on my mind.” That year’s judging panel included Coldplay and Tom Waits. “Turned Around Me” went on to the semi-finals of the 2023 Music in Motion Canada Awards. Rounding out the EP, “Born to Rock Like No Morrison,” co-written with composer Vincent Xavier St-Laurent, was inspired by a childhood photo of Montreal rocker Jonas listening to music on his earphones.
Hagiel has performed professionally since 2009 and calls her years with the People’s Gospel Choir of Montreal transformative. Alongside fellow choir members, she sang backing vocals on Nadja’s Christmas album. At the Bell Centre, she added vocals to a song for Joey McIntyre of New Kids on the Block, and in the summer of 2014, Gregory Charles picked her as a choir singer for several Mondial Loto-Québec shows. In 2012, she was one of just 140 singers chosen from more than 5,000 hopefuls for the blind auditions of La Voix.
“I am concentrating on music because it has always been natural, less harsh as a process. I often sing instinctively. It is a visceral need,” she says. “I have several mentors in the music industry. Being chosen to do vocals at the Bell Centre for Joey McIntyre opened my eyes to my first passion and the opportunities that await us when we have a dream.”
She keeps a favourite line from the film Mademoiselle C close to her heart: “You are the artist of your own life.” With I Am Enough of a Woman, Hagiel is living those words, carrying that little girl from the living room all the way to the microphone.
For further information on the artist, please visit the following links:
- https://hagiel.org/home-accueil
- https://www.instagram.com/hagiel_org/
- https://www.facebook.com/Hagiel.org
Images provided courtesy of Eric Alper
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