Musical talent is a gift that can run deep in a family and can be the roots of the family tree. This is the case for Metis singer and songwriter Joe H. Henry. Henry is no stranger to the area or to music in Manitoba. His father was a well-known musician across the Prairies, with roots in the San Clara area. This is what drew Henry into music and into the area.
“I was born in Winnipeg and we moved between there and Stonewall,” said Henry. “My father was Harvey Henry and my mother is Tanis Nott. I was really young when we left Manitoba and headed to British Columbia. My father stayed in Winnipeg with my aunt. We moved around a lot during my childhood.
“I would go back to Prosper Valley, which was named after my grandfather Prosper Henry, with my dad from the time I was really little, up until I was about 18 years old. Every summer I spent with my dad was in that valley. It was constant music all the time. My uncles, aunts and father were always playing music. They would all get together and just play music.
“I remember my uncle Ephrem gave me my first musical instrument, which was the fiddle,” said Henry. “There was an old photo of me as a small child, sitting on the table holding that fiddle.
“They would build these great big bonfires that would sometimes go on for a couple of days. Also, in the kitchen of the old farmhouse, they would get together to talk, have tea, play cards and then play music. All of us kids would get put to bed in the house, and we would just go and sit by the window and listen to the music coming from outside by the bonfire.
“My entire childhood was immersed in music,” said Henry. “I was constantly surrounded by it. I came to realize that the reason my family had this gift of music was because the Metis people were meant to be the carriers of the story, not the creators of the tradition. What better way to spread and share that story than in a song?
“My father played almost any musical instrument, but he focused on playing guitar and bass and was mainly a singer, like me. My dad was mostly known for his voice. He won awards with the Harvey Henry Band. He was my biggest musical influence as a child. Listening to him play in the Harvey Henry Band and watching my family at gatherings, I just knew that was the path that I was going to end up on. I just watched how they did it, from writing to music to performing on stage.
“I slowly learned to play the fiddle, but then moved on to playing the guitar,” said Henry. “I always wanted to be a singer and playing the guitar was a way to accompany that. I built up my vocals by learning to yodel.”
It wasn’t until Henry experience a great loss that brought him back to Manitoba and his roots. Upon coming back to the area, he became connected again with family.
“I came back to Manitoba in 2013, when my father passed away,” said Henry. “I was living in Montreal at the time, and was heavily steeped in music and on the road, while also having a restaurant in Montreal. I got a call on my birthday from my Aunt Connie, who informed me of the news. It was tough.
“At that time, I realized I needed to get back to my roots. I made the plan to start my move back home to Manitoba. It happened really quickly. I stayed with my Aunt Connie and Uncle Gordon in San Clara for a bit, and started working on the same farm my dad had been working on, which was for Dave Grega. Then Dave gave me a place to stay at one of the houses he had on the farmland.”
It wasn’t long before Henry decided it was time to plant his own family roots and got married to a long-time friend. Together, they decided to build a home and a family and settled on coming to the Swan Valley area.
“I moved to Alpine a few years after coming back to Manitoba, in the San Clara area,” said Henry. “My wife, Shelby, and I needed a bigger home for us, including her two daughters, to live in. During this time, I had completely gotten out of music. I would occasionally just play music with my family. I felt I couldn’t be a musician and a father, as I needed to provide for them.
“It wasn’t until I played some music at the Benito Personal Care Home for a bit that I realized I needed to be doing more musically,” said Henry. “Then came the opportunity to perform at the Shell River Jamboree with Vaughan Poyser. Vaughan said he was interested in coming out and said he would bring Chris Taylor to play guitar and someone I might know to play drums. It ended up being my dad’s old drummer, Doug Yuel. We played the Shell River Jamboree together and it was pretty wild.
“I knew I couldn’t stay away from music, because it is a big part of who I am, so I had to learn to walk the line,” said Henry. “I would play a few gigs and then work in manufacturing for Ag Shield in Benito.”
While at work, Henry sustained an injury that almost cost him his music career.
“I had an unfortunate accident at work where I crushed my fingers and detached the tendons on the top and bottom of my chording hand,” said Henry. “I thought I would never play music again. When I went to the hospital, I was first told by a doctor that I would be fine in a few days once the swelling went down. I got a second opinion, because I couldn’t close my hand at all. It was then that I was told that I had detached the tendons on the top and bottom of my pointer, middle and ring fingers.
“I went to Winnipeg to a plastic surgeon who fixes these types of injuries. They said they could do an operation, but I asked what the likelihood was of my being able to play guitar again, and they said it wasn’t great. I went home and thought about it. I decided to reach out to someone else; I wound up doing physiotherapy instead. Now I have full use of my fingers like it never happened.

“That all led me to think about how I was going to provide, so I went on into sales,” said Henry. “I was trying to pretend I wasn’t a singer and songwriter, but instead focus on selling farm equipment. I managed to connect with a distant relative of mine that I didn’t even know, who is a fiddle player. We played together and would sometimes go play at the Benito Personal Care Home. That helped to keep me connected to music.
“It has now gotten to a point where the thing that I was trying to get away from is now the thing that I need to help provide for my family with.”
The winds of change came blowing in and Henry and his family knew it was time to move on. The calling for him to embrace his musical talents was strong and it led him away from Manitoba to another area rich in music.
“We left the Swan Valley area in 2019,” said Henry. “After playing a cousin’s wedding, it came to us that it was time for a change. All signs started pointing to the Maritimes, where we had never been. It felt like life was trying to tell us something and we needed to let it play out.
“When we came out to the East Coast, I wanted to do something different. I wound up selling farm equipment again, then when we started expecting our youngest, Wilder. We started having conversations about being happy with what I was doing. One day, we took a drive and it led to Shelby telling me to pull into a Long & McQuade parking lot. She told me to go in there and get the guitar that would get me back into songwriting. She said if it doesn’t work, at least you can say you gave it a shot.”
It took a bit of time, but then Henry began to make connections and started to work with some musical geniuses who had experience in bringing artists’ music to the forefront. It wasn’t long after that that Henry released his first EP.
“I became connected with a guy who started the Halifax Folk Festival and managed a lot of talented musicians from the East Coast,” said Henry. “He was put in my path by a good friend of mine and it all fell into place.”
In 2023, Henry released his debut EP, Keep the Fire Burning, which garnered multiple award nominations. Then in 2025, he released his second EP, Real Things, which reached number one on the Indigenous Music Countdown.
“I was working with Jamie Junger on Keep the Fire Burning, so I could get into the East Coast Music Conference with it,” said Henry. “Instead, he had a friend whom he called upon to help give us some pointers on it. This guy happened to be the one who was the producer for Sloan. That was pretty wild. He came over and listened to the song. He asked if that was all I wanted to do was get into the conference with that song, because he had some different news to tell me. That is where it all started to take place and I wrote the rest of the EP.
“With the song, Real Things, that was a culmination of everything that happened in the span of the release of Keep the Fire Burning and all of the opportunities that started to come out. It led to my first time being in Australia at the Woodwork Folk Festival.”
Henry draws his inspiration for writing songs from everyday life and that has been the focus of the songs he’s released and future ones he is working on.
“I don’t write about myself when it comes to songs,” said Henry. “For me, it’s not a cathartic experience to write a song like I’m writing in a personal journal. I feel that those moments were all lived and they served their purpose. I don’t like to look back at them unless there is a lesson to be learned. I would rather write about things that people are going through or things they might need and find how it could work lyrically with the idea that has picked me at that moment.”
Henry has been announced as one of the Socan Foundation’s 2025 TD Incubator Participants. He received a $3,000 funding grant as well as mentorship from leaders and representatives in the music industry, such as Billboard, Apple Music, Spotify, Warner, Universal, Sony and more. Recently, he just came home from a tour overseas and is working on his next one.
“This coming April will be my third time going to Australia and I just got back from my first time performing in the U.K. in Ireland, Scotland, Whales and England,” said Henry.
Henry is always looking to inspire and foster a love of music in people. He remembers what it was like to get started and be involved in music, and he hopes that more people will find the same joy and fulfillment it has brought him in his life.
“If there’s anything I can ever do to help Metis kids in the area, I’m more than happy to look into any opportunities,” said Henry.