Album Notes

I have loved to sing for as long as I can remember. Singing is my greatest passion and songs touch the mystery of my soul. When I sing, I feel my heart open as my body becomes a cathedral of sound dedicated to my audiences and to God. Songs and singers are, perhaps, the alchemists of word and music that turn the world into a place worthy of our yearning, as so beautifully stated by Salman Rushdie. I am so grateful to count myself among the singers of the world.

As a young child, I was inspired to sing by my mother, Cis Scanlin, who was an alluring and beautiful torch singer in the Vaudeville tradition of Sophie Tucker and Fanny Brice. Knowing I had a great aunt named Jenny Cushing who sang opera in Ireland in the 19th century bolstered my desire to learn my craft as thoroughly as I might.

I began performing as a teenager, singing around campfires, in churches, and coffeehouses in the Philadelphia area, where I grew up. Striking out on my own, at the tender age of 18, I toured Ireland, Portugal, and England, singing songs of peace and love for eager and sometimes feisty audiences.

When the beautiful Berkshires of Massachusetts beckoned me in 1978, my family and I moved to the Pioneer Valley and found a lively music scene and many fine friends. It was there that I began to sing pop and show tunes for bread and butter, while building a catalog of about fifty original songs, collaborating with my late husband, Tom Devine. Together we performed throughout the US in resorts, concert halls, and clubs.

It has been my privilege and great pleasure to share the stage with such icons as James Taylor, Sweet Honey in the Rock, Pete Seeger, Lauren Bacall, Peter Yarrow, and Peter, Paul and Mary. In 1983, I appeared on CNN numerous times and in the Smithsonian PBS TV documentary “20 Years Later: The Martin Luther King March on Washington”. To be part of this event was a shining hour for me, singing “America the Beautiful” as throngs of marchers gathered at our nation’s Capitol on that steamy August morning to proclaim “We still have a dream.”

I am so thrilled to have had the opportunity to record some of my most favorite songs on "Prophecies of Love".

“Shane’s song—a delight to ear, eye, heart” --Ram Dass

“The beautiful, hopeful music of Shane Marie Devine provides an inspiring vision of a non-competitive, healing world.”
--Frances Crowe, American Friends Service Committee