Michael Breen is the former stage name of Michel Pépin (born 1960 in Nicolet, Quebec), a Canadian pop and rock singer and session musician."Quebec singer takes care making leap into English". ''

Toronto Star The ''Toronto Star'' is a Canadian English-language broadsheet daily newspaper. It is owned by Toronto Star Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary of Torstar Corporation and part of Torstar's Daily News Brands (Torstar), Daily News Brands division. ...

'', February 11, 1988. Although he released only one album as a solo artist, he had a hit single with "Rain" in 1987, and received a

Juno Award The Juno Awards (stylized as JUNOS), or simply known as the Junos, are awards presented by Canadian Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences, the Canadian Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences to recognize outstanding achievements in Canada's mu ...

nomination for Most Promising Male Vocalist at the Juno Awards of 1989."Juno candidates announced". ''

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'', February 2, 1989. Pépin first moved to

Montreal Montreal is the List of towns in Quebec, largest city in the Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Quebec, the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, second-largest in Canada, and the List of North American cit ...

at age 17 to pursue work in the music industry. He released one album with the band Concert in 1982."Breen, Michael"
at

canoe.ca Canoe.com is an English-language Canadian portal site and website network, and is a subsidiary of Postmedia Network. The phrase Canadian Online Explorer appears in the header; the name is also evidently a play on words on canoe (or ''canoë'' in ...

's Pop Music Encyclopedia. Although a francophone, he was more interested in pursuing stardom in the much larger English-language market than in limiting himself to the French language music scene in Quebec, and worked with

Bill Sweetman Bill Sweetman (born 1956 in Basingstoke, Hampshire, UK) is a former editor for Jane's and currently an editor for Aviation Week group. He is a writer of more than 50 books on military aircraft. He lives in Oakdale, Minnesota. He is noted for his ...

and Geoff Hughes to write and record English language songs. Their first collaboration, "Face to Face", was a finalist in the 1985 National Talent Search sponsored by '' Music Express'' and

MuchMusic Much is a Canadian English language discretionary specialty channel owned by BCE Inc. through its Bell Media subsidiary that airs programming aimed at teenagers and young adults. It is headquartered at 299 Queen Street West in what was o ...

. He signed to

Alert Records Alert Music was a recording, publishing, producing, and artist management company founded in 1984 by W. Tom Berry and Marc Durand, based in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It was home to Alert Records, an independent record label. The company has no c ...

, and under the stage name Michael Breen he released a self-titled album on the label in 1987. Two singles, "Rain" and "How Will I Know", were released from the album. "Rain", which was written by

Sass Jordan Sarah "Sass" Jordan (born 23 December 1962) is an English-born Canadian rock singer from Montreal, Quebec. Her first single, "Tell Somebody," from her debut album of the same title won the Juno Award for Most Promising Female Vocalist in 1989. S ...

, was a Top 40 hit in ''

RPM Revolutions per minute (abbreviated rpm, RPM, rev/min, r/min, or r⋅min−1) is a unit of rotational speed (or rotational frequency) for rotating machines. One revolution per minute is equivalent to hertz. Standards ISO 80000-3:2019 def ...

'', peaking at No. 33 the week of November 21, 1987, but the album was only a modest seller, peaking at No. 91 in the week of November 7. His video for "Rain" garnered a

Prix Félix Prix was an American power pop band formed in Memphis, Tennessee, in 1975 by Tommy Hoehn and Jon Tiven. The group ended up primarily as a studio project. Its recordings were produced by Tiven along with former Big Star member Chris Bell, who ...

nomination for Best Video in 1988, and he was nominated for Most Promising Male Vocalist at the Juno Awards in 1989. Pépin never released another album as a solo artist, although he continued in the music business as a session guitarist for artists such as Luba,

Kate and Anna McGarrigle Kate McGarrigle (February 6, 1946 – January 18, 2010) and Anna McGarrigle (born December 4, 1944) were a duo of folk rock and country folk Canadian singer-songwriters (and sisters) from Quebec, who performed together until Kate's death in 2 ...

Sarah McLachlan Sarah Ann McLachlan (born January 28, 1968) is a Canadian singer-songwriter. As of 2015, she had sold over 40 million albums worldwide. McLachlan's best-selling album to date is ''Surfacing (album), Surfacing'' (1997), for which she won two G ...

Martha Wainwright Martha Wainwright (born May 8, 1976) is a Canadian singer-songwriter and musician. She has released seven critically-acclaimed studio albums. Wainwright is the daughter of musicians Kate McGarrigle and Loudon Wainwright III and the younger si ...

Emmylou Harris Emmylou Harris (born April 2, 1947) is an American singer, songwriter, musician, bandleader, and activist. She is considered one of the leading music artists behind the country rock genre in the 1970s and the Americana (music), Americana genre ...

and

Jean Leloup Jean Leclerc (; born May 14, 1961) is a Québécois singer-songwriter and author from Sainte-Foy, Quebec, Canada. He is popularly known as Jean Leloup (which he likes to translate to John the Wolf), a stage name he kept using until 2006, when h ...

."Michel Pepin: Credits"

AllMusic AllMusic (previously known as All-Music Guide and AMG) is an American online database, online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on Musical artist, musicians and Mus ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Breen, Michael Canadian rock singers Canadian pop singers Living people 20th-century Canadian male singers 20th-century Canadian guitarists 21st-century Canadian guitarists Singers from Quebec Canadian male singer-songwriters Canadian session musicians People from Centre-du-Québec 1960 births Canadian rock guitarists Canadian pop guitarists Canadian male guitarists 21st-century Canadian male musicians 20th-century Canadian singer-songwriters