Melanie Therese Shanahan (January 196410 December 2003) was an Australian world-folk singer-songwriter, choir director and vocal coach. She was a member of the groups, Arramaieda (1987–95) and Akasa (1998–2002). She also collaborated with Coco's Lunch and Safara. Shanahan had mental health problems from the 1990s, and she died from suicide at the age of 39. Biography Melanie Therese Shanahan, performed in Sydney from the mid-1970s. She was influenced by political singer-songwriters, in particular Sweet Honey in the Rock. She had no formal singing lessons. Shanahan moved to Hobart, to participate in the environmentalist movement, where she formed a female a cappella band, Arramaieda (a.k.a. Aramieeda), in the mid-1980s. They were named for an aboriginal woman, "who lived on Bruny Island (off the Tasmanian coast). [Wace recalled] 'She was a great singer and had a lot of strength and vitality'." The group began as an irregular ensemble with nine or ten members. In 1988 they recorded and produced, A capella group Aramieeda [Arramaieda] 10 songs, by the line-up of Shanahan, Rachel Hore, Deborah Wace, plus Ruth, Heather and Trish (surnames not recorded). It was recorded at The Sound Cellar, Hobart and issued via LINC Tasmania as an audiocassette. By 1990 the line-up was a trio, comprising Shanahan together with Rachel Hore and Deborah Wace. They recorded 12 tracks at the ABC studios in December, which "received national airplay": they followed with an Australian tour including an impromptu appearance at the Adelaide Fringe Festival. Mike Jackson of The Canberra Times caught their gig at a local venue, Tilley Devine's Cafe Gallery, in April 1990, and observed that their music, "is full of lovely harmonies and a selection of songs that places them somewhere between The Flying Pickets and Sydney women's a'capella group Blindman's Holiday. More folk than the former and more up tempo than the latter." Arramaieda released their studio album, More Ways than One, in 1992 via Natural Symphonies, which was recorded by a four-piece: Shanahan, Hore, Teresa Castley and Kirsten MacKenzie at Studios 301, Sydney in June of that year. Six of 14 tracks are written by Shanahan: Karen Fredericks of Green Left Weekly felt, "each shines like a jewel. 'Flying Away from You' and "The Sea" draw on nature as a source of inner peace in a world in which it has become difficult 'to know what to feel'. The chorus of 'Troubled Souls', 'I'm teaching my heart to