A life built around music.

Education and training

The early years.

Melina was born in Montreal, Canada, and started playing piano at age 4. She began writing her first original songs at age 11. As a teenager, she figured out how to self-record her songs at home using simple recording gear and getting her friends to play various instruments, forming her first teen band, FUBAR. With her parents' blessing, she was active in the arts community of her school and city, participating in every talent show and community event she could find. At the age of 15, she became the Canadian winner of an international talent pageant, the Hal Jackson Talented Teens Competition. She went on to represent Canada in the final round which was held in New York City and was hosted by guest performer Alicia Keys, one of her biggest influences.

Her formal training continued with a Double diploma in Music & Science from Marianopolis College in 2005, a Bachelor of Music from McGill University in 2008 and a Performer’s Diploma from the Royal Conservatory of Music in Toronto in 2010. Following her graduation from university, Melina was ready to enter the real world as a professional musician.

• Piano at age 4
• Songwriting at age 11
• BMus, McGill University
• RCM Performer’s Diploma

A Local Montreal Artist

Winning over Montreal's heart.

Melina started performing professionally on piano and voice in 2009, when she landed her first steady hotel piano-bar gig at the Fairmont Queen Elizabeth Hotel in Montreal, a position she held for 3 years. While there, she learned the art of performing for the crowd, steadily growing her repertoire list request by request. One gig led to another and before long she was the one of the most in-demand pianist-singers in the city, winning hearts one gig at a time. She regularly performed in many of the most well-known live music venues in the city, including the House of Jazz, Upstairs Jazz Bar and Grill, and Dieze Onze. Ultimately, she was asked to perform during the famous Montreal Jazz Festival with her own band, The Velvet Lounge. As a band-leader, she also put together a high-energy wedding band, the Masters of Groove, with which she performed at weddings, corporate events, and even at the Montreal Casino. While performing was always her main passion, in 2017 Melina also started teaching piano locally to kids, teens and adults. At one point, she had a full studio of over 40 private students weekly. She still teaches to this day to a select group of motivated students, both online and in person. Alongside performing and teaching, Melina got into recording official albums, releasing her first EP "City of Love" in 2009, followed by her first full-length album "Hold On" in 2011. Inspired by her audiences who loved jazz, she decided to record a jazz album "The Velvet Lounge" in 2018. In 2022, just after the Covid pandemic, she released 3 additional songs from her newest project "Dark Fairytales" which showed her exploring a whole new sound.

Discovering the World

On the international stage.

Over time, Melina was delighted to discover that music could bring her around the world to places she never would have imagined. In 2017, she lived and worked for 6 months in Busan, South Korea, performing at the Park Hyatt Hotel for high-end clients. She took that opportunity to learn some Korean and made lifelong friends through that experience. From that point on, she got the travel bug. Working closely with her booking agents, she was invited multiple times to perform as a resident special guest at several hotel resorts in idyllic locations, such as the Club Med in the Bahamas, the Dominican Republic, and Mexico, even during the Covid years. She also held contracts on a private cruise ship called The World twice, visiting very intriguing destinations such as Alaska, Russia, Japan, Croatia, Greece, Spain, Italy and France. In 2021, her travelling musical journey eventually landed her in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, where she met her husband Elijah Gee, who is a well-known pianist and musical director. She was immediately picked up by local booking agents and started working the scene. In 2023, she was invited to do a short Las Vegas tour, performing at several hotels on the strip including Mandalay Bay and ARIA. Later that year, she was also the featured artist at the Deering Estate, performing at one of Miami’s most prestigious live music venues for art appreciators. Melina started really getting into the piano-bar entertainment world when she was hired as a full time performer for the new Howl at the Moon in Fort Lauderdale in late 2024. For 14 months she worked 4 nights a week in a dueling pianist capacity with other members of the team, while also supplementing on supporting instruments like drums, bass and guitar. Today, Melina is an active singer, pianist and multi-instrumentalist, performing at various venues across South Florida. She performs as a soloist as well as an invited singer for local bands, and most recently with her newest project, Melina Soochan and the French Twist, a tribute to French Jazz and a nod to her Montreal roots.