Saskatchewan, Canada · country

Kalsey Kulyk

1 festival played →

Canadian country singer who writes plainly about hard things, with a survivor's directness in the lyrics.

Kulyk grew up in Hudson Bay, Saskatchewan, where her family worked at a local mill and farmed on the side. She is of Ukrainian descent and spent her childhood entering talent competitions, winning the Pasquia Idol contest in Manitoba, with Shania Twain as her chief musical influence. As a teenager she was diagnosed with Hodgkin's lymphoma and underwent months of chemotherapy, an experience that later shaped much of her songwriting.

At nineteen she moved to Las Vegas to work with producer Richard Dashut, releasing early singles including 'With You' on the Calgary label Phaymis Records. In 2017 she won the CCMA Discovery Award, then signed to olé Media Management's Red Dot label and relocated to Nashville. Her 2019 self-titled EP, featuring 'More Time' and 'Bad Liar,' earned a CCMA nomination for Roots Album of the Year.

'Who I Was,' released in 2020, became her first single to chart on Billboard Canada Country. After going independent, she released 'Big Deal' in 2022 and 'Ain't Enough Whiskey' in 2023, and competed on the third season of Canada's Got Talent. 'Love Me Like an Outlaw' gave her a first top-20 country hit that year, ahead of her debut album, Outlaw Poetry, in February 2024.

Kulyk signed to Universal Music Canada in late 2024 and released her major-label debut single, 'You Fight Dirty,' in February 2025, followed by 'Till I Get to Heaven' that July. The move came after a run of independent-era singles had already built her profile on Canadian country radio.

She married fellow Canadian country singer Eric Ethridge in December 2019. During the pandemic the couple left Nashville and toured Canada living out of a van, a run they called 'Love on the Road.' Their son, Wilder, was born in August 2021, and the family now lives in Beaumont, Alberta.

Read more

country