About Melissa
Melissa began studying classical piano at age six. A year later, she took up the violin, the instrument that would become the center of her musical life for the next fourteen years. While her violin studies intensified in high school, Melissa taught herself how to play the guitar. Surprisingly, the Covid lockdown in 2020 gifted her with the time and headspace to start writing songs.
Being told from about the age of 14 that she sounds like Joni Mitchell, Melissa grew in affinity for the famed folk star. The smoky sweetness of Joni’s voice and nostalgic charm of her lyrics continue to inspire Melissa as an artist, pushing her to explore the genres of folk, jazz, and alternative pop in a fusion of sound.
After a spiritual retreat in 2021, Melissa began writing the first songs that would eventually make up her debut album. Melissa describes Blue Ceilings, with its ten songs full of soulful lyrics and sound worlds, as “encompassing a three-year journey of building up a ‘house in my brain’ where good and bad experiences, memories, and habits of mind receive attention and life as residents of a sort.” The album pursues self-understanding, acceptance, and healing. Melissa’s deep faith, loving family, and fervor for life encouraged her in the creation and completion of this project, and what emerges is a space refurbished with painted ceilings, candles of forgiveness, and a widely-swinging door securing a new-found freedom. Listeners will experience both the thought patterns evoked by the songs and the external things represented in them, leaving with feelings of introspection, nostalgia, and release.
