From 1959 to 1961 she studied singing under Dina Maria Narici at the Conservatoire de musique du Québec à Montréal.
[1] After winning the Prix d'Europe in 1960, Martel used the prize to pursue further voice training in Italy with Maria-Teresa Pediconi and in piano with Giorgio Favaretto at the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome from 1961-1964.
While there, she made her professional opera debut at the Teatro dell'Opera di Roma as Laetitia in Gian Carlo Menotti's The Old Maid and the Thief.
She appeared as a leading soprano at opera houses in Italy, France, Switzerland, and Canada in the 1960s and 1970s.
[1] Martel joined the voice faculty of the Conservatoire de musique du Québec à Trois-Rivières in 1974, and in 1980 she began teaching as a part of the voice faculty at the Conservatoire de musique du Québec à Montréal.