At 9 years old, he was among a dancing crowd of 10,000 watching the late South African pop star Brenda Fassie at Somhlolo Soccer Stadium, Swaziland, Africa. With apartheid still strong next door in South Africa, this concert reverberated on many levels: musically, socially, and politically. Mix this life-defining experience with Manitoban-Québécois roots, a stylistically diverse musical repertoire, the piano, accordian, guitar, and a voice that disarms his audiences, and you have the multi-faceted sound of Mark Berube.
Mark was a Peacedriven Songwriting Award Honourable Mention winner for 2006. His second album “Sketches from the sidewalk” has received coast to coast radio play on the CBC (Richardson’s Roundup and North by Northwest), Canadian College radio stations, as well as college radio in Bergen, Norway and public radio in Fribourg, Switzerland.
He has toured Canada five times, and Western Europe four times (England, Scotland, Wales, Denmark, Germany, and Switzerland) as a musician and spoken word artist.
Mark has just recently finished his fourth album “what the river gave the boat”.
He has recently received a Canada Council Grant for the Fugitives, a spoken/word music project of which he is a part. He also composes music for dance and theater. Most recently, he worked wth Leaky Heaven Circus, Vancouver. He received a Jessie Richardson Reward Nomination for the music he composed and performed in this project.
Performance highlights: headlining the Montreal Festival Des Voix Ameriques (February 2006), Showcase performances at the ROXY and VIPER Room, Los Angeles, CA, a packed inn in Hempstead, England with an old acoustic piano (May 2007), The Great Escape Festival, Brighton, UK with Dan Mangan (May 2007).
