It was a teenage dream-come-true.īefore long, we found ourselves with an extraordinary collection of recordings: intimate at times, unexpected at others. It seemed to seep into the instruments and walls and inspire more artists to come play. To our delight, the more musicians performed at The Cherrytree House, the more creative DNA they left there. Staff members Andrea, Scott, Kelvin & Brad helped capture the sessions on video and soon we began posting footage of these magical performances at Requests poured in from enthusiastic 'Rec'ers' (members of our community) to make the audio available so we introduced a series of 3 EP's entitled 'The Cherrytree Sessions.' These were 3-song sets from Robyn, Lady Gaga & Keane (all still available).

With the kind encouragement of Interscope Geffen A&M's Chairman Jimmy Iovine (who patiently tolerated the sound checks from his office down the hall) and the expert help of my good friend and skilled engineer, Tony Ugval, I began recording performances from the talented artists that would visit Cherrytree. Just after starting Cherrytree Records in 2005 with the release of Feist's 'Let It Die' album, I took all of the instruments I'd bought over the years and set them up in my office. I held onto that notion until I finally got the chance to implement it. Oh, and wouldn't it be killer if everything was pre-wired to record what came out? Still, it sparked a dream for me: To one day have a space where instruments would be permanently set up and anybody could play them at any time.

I realized only later that this would prevent them from practicing their individual parts in between rehearsals and seriously affect our ability to sound good at gigs. I remember asking the kids in the band to leave their instruments at my house in between rehearsals. When I was 15 and living in East Lansing, Michigan, I convinced my folks to let my band rehearse in our living room (my sister's string quartet had already commandeered the basement).

Lady gaga the cherrytree sessions