Billboard Canada's Breakthrough Artists of 2023: Charlotte Cardin

It's been a good year for Canadian artists breaking through on the charts. To celebrate, Billboard Canada is taking a look at a handful of musicians who made their mark this year. Read them all here.

Charlotte Cardin had a major year, from Quebec to the rest of Canada and beyond, into Europe and the United States. The singer-songwriter, who mostly sings in English, released her second album, 99 Nights, in August, and several tracks quickly became hits.

The first single, "Confetti," released in April, has spent 34 weeks on the Billboard Canadian Hot 100, where it's currently No. 29. The track also secured a spot on the Canada AC Debut for 20 consecutive weeks following its release, while her unreleased single "Feel Good" also found its place in the same category at the end of October.

Her album 99 Nights, meanwhile, remained on the Billboard charts for Canadian albums for 16 weeks, and Charlotte Cardin was featured in the Canada Emerging Artists chart from April onwards.

As noted by the newspaper Le Devoir at the beginning of last summer, Charlotte Cardin is the only Quebecois artist in the 100 most listened-to tracks on digital platforms in Quebec, according to data compiled by Luminate. Cultural journalist Étienne Paré writes about this in his article "La musique franco, grande absente des palmarès" (French music, a major absence from the charts): "In the week of June 9 to 15, her hit 'Confetti' took the 9th position among the songs that generated the most listens. Her latest release, 99 Nights, took the 27th place immediately upon its release, surpassing the current hits of international megastars like Taylor Swift or Ed Sheeran: a true achievement."

She didn't ignore her French-speaking fans. In November, Cardin also sheared the EP Une semaine à Paris, which includes a bilingual English-French version of "Confetti" and the track "Un peu trop."

She's been making a big splash in France, too. Journalist Sophie Rosemont highlights Charlotte Cardin's potential abroad in an article for one of the leading cultural magazine in France, Les Inrocks. "A star in her home country, the Montrealer could well become one in France thanks to an ultra-accessible pop that she embodies with sensitivity," she wrote. In the French edition ofELLE, journalist Pauline Weiss believes that 99 Nights "should open up other borders" for Charlotte Cardin.

Azzedine Fall (interviewed by Billboard Canada during the M for Montreal festival), the head of editorial strategy at the French streaming platform Deezer, believes that Quebec artists who sing in English have an advantage over the French. "Here, Anglophone culture is different from what we have in France, and it's much more credible," he explains.

Still in France, one of the main markets for exporting Quebec music alongside the United States and the United Kingdom, Cardin has recently participated in the singing competition Star Academy. There, she performed "Anyone Who Loves Me" from her album Phoenix (2021) in a duet with one of the contestants. It's worth noting that since its launch in the early 2000s, the show has made a point of inviting international music stars. Kim Wilde, Lionel Richie, Stevie Wonder, Robert Charlebois, and Elton John, among others, have appeared on the show.

And let's not forget the success of Cardin's extensive tour this year. From San Francisco to Vancouver, Istanbul, Berlin, Los Angeles, Halifax, Winnipeg, Chicago and the Montreal Osheaga Festival, the singer-songwriter has been everywhere. While she's not a mainstay on the American charts just yet, it's not uncommon for her concerts to quickly sell out wherever she goes.

Tickets are already scarce for the majority of her upcoming tour dates, which include four stops at the Place Bell in Laval, as well as shows in Toronto, Paris, Cairo, Hamilton and Ottawa, among others.

For Cardin, 2024 could be just as big.

This article was originally published in French.