Recording studio, Berlin
cherryontop
We put a cherry on top.
One room, one team, one finished track. We produce, record, mix and master — for artists, for brands, and for the films made next door at katsu.media.
What we do
Full production
on request
You arrive with an idea, you leave with a finished song.
- Arrangement and production
- Recording in the studio
- Mixing and mastering included
- Instrumental and a version with backings
Mixing
on request
Your recording, brought into shape.
- Balance, space, frequencies
- Mastering included
- Two rounds of revisions
- Stems on request
Mastering
on request
The final polish, ready for the platforms.
- Stereo and stem mastering
- One round of revisions
- Streaming-ready levels
Beats
on request
Made to order, exclusively yours.
- From straightforward to played parts
- Finished instrumental, mixed and mastered
- Two rounds of revisions
- Exclusive — never resold
Recording
on request
The room and the gear, with one of our team at the desk.
- From four hours — that is the smallest booking
- Vocals and instruments
- Producer or engineer alongside you
- By the hour after that: we stay until it is done
Accommodation
on request
Sleep where the record is made — the room is inside the studio.
- Inside the studio, no commute between bed and desk
- For sessions running over several days
- On request, subject to availability
Improve your production
on request
You have already built something. We listen and put a cherry on top.
- We listen to the version you have
- You hear what there is to gain — honestly
- The price comes after that, not before
- From single tracks to the whole production
Feedback
on request
An honest ear on your work.
- Arrangement, mix, melody, form
- One hour, online or in the studio
- A short summary afterwards
Every project is quoted individually — by effort, by scope, and by what you bring with you. Send us your enquiry and you get an offer in numbers. Mixing and mastering are included where they belong to the job. All quotes are net and exclude VAT.
The room
A rooftop studio in Berlin-Köpenick. No open-plan floor, no neon — one room you can sit in all day.
How the studio evolvedJan 2024 – today
Jan 2024
An empty room
A top-floor room in Köpenick, half painted. This is where the work starts: the insulation is already on the floor.
The beginning: half the wall blue, the rest still bare paper. 
The roller is still standing against the wall, the floor under a dust sheet. 
Looking up into the roof window. That is where the daylight comes from. Jan 2024
Floor and window
Two days later: the floor is down and the window is set into the wall. From here on it stops being a room and becomes a plan.
Painted, floor laid, nothing else. 
The window is in the wall, the floor is still the bare subfloor. 
Closer in: the frame is up, the cable still hanging loose. 
The floor is down. The window to the booth on the left, the roof window on the right, the radiator below. 
The same corner from the door, at the end of the second day. Mar 2024
The slatted wall
Three months of acoustics: absorbers under the roof slope, the slatted wall in front — here as a timelapse, slat by slat. It is the reason the room does not sound like a room.
The timelapse: slat by slat, over several evenings. 
The first absorber under the roof slope. Black, so it disappears into the room. 
From the side you can see the gap behind it. Without that air an absorber barely works in the low end. 
All slats on — still without light and without gear. 
The first time with light behind the slats. Apr 2024
The booth
A room of its own behind the opening. The pane between them is why you can still see each other while recording.
From the booth into the control room — through the window that went in back in January. 
Absorbers left and right, the keyboard already in place. 
From the booth: absorbers, door, the desk behind them. 
From above: the microphone over the rug. The rug is not decoration, it takes the reflection off the floor. 
The same evening, somebody is already at the microphone. 
Between two takes. The stool is as much part of the kit as the microphone. Apr 2024
The patch panel
Twelve sockets, each soldered and labelled by hand. None of it is visible later — you only notice it because no cable runs across the room.
The back, before the lid goes on: sockets, wires, labels. 
Contact by contact. Which socket goes where is written next to it in marker. 
From the front, before fitting: XLR, jack, USB, network — numbered one to twelve. 
On the wall, one cable in. Every signal has gone through this plate ever since. Apr 2024
The control room
Four and a half months after the first picture: desk, monitors, carpet, instruments. The daylight comes from above and stays.
The control room as it has stood ever since. 
At night, shortly after the desk went in. 
In the slatted wall: bass, tape machine, books. The shelf is acoustics and storage at once. May 2024
Light and details
The rest is handwork: a strip of old wood with knobs, a lamp on top, light behind every slat.
Milled into the old board: MIDI DOBRYN. The knobs above it belong to it. 
The same strip, lamp on. 
A bulb in front of the slats — more an eye-catcher than a light. 
The shelf from below, light behind every slat. 
The instruments move in at the start of June. Oct 2024
In use ever since
Two at the desk, lamp on, machine running. The rest of this page was made here.
In use since the day it was finished. 
June 2024: two at the desk, the screen full. 
A commercial: Yura at the desk, Anna from the recording team beside him, the voice artist in the window. 
The sheet sits next to the keyboard. Not everything in a session is technology. 
An ordinary working day in the finished room.
What is in the room
The room was built, not furnished: a decoupled booth, absorbers made for it, calibrated monitoring. What stands in it is listed here — not everything, but everything that matters.
Monitoring
Two pairs of speakers and a calibrated sub. What carries on the large pair has to hold up on the small one — otherwise it will not survive outside.
- Neumann KH 310 A
- Neumann KH 120 A
- Neumann KH 750 DSP
- Neumann NDH 20
- beyerdynamic DT 770 Pro
Recording
The path from a voice into the machine, kept short. The less that sits in between, the less there is to repair later.
- JZ Microphones Vintage 12
- sE Electronics Gemini II
- Triton Audio D20
- Universal Audio Apollo x4
Instruments
Played, not loaded. What comes out of these sounds like an evening in this room, not like a factory library.
- Moog Subsequent 37
- Clavia Nord Electro 6D 73
- Akai MPC Live
- Roland SP-404 MK2
- Polyend Tracker Mini
- Boss RC-300 Loop Station
- TC Electronic 2290-DT
- Native Instruments Komplete Kontrol
- Harley Benton Talk Box
On location
Not every sound is made in the studio. For production sound on set and noises from outside, the same chain travels.
- Røde NTG3
- beyerdynamic MCE 530
- Zoom H5
- IK Multimedia iRig Pro Duo
If your production needs something that is not here, we say so before we take the job — and rent it in rather than work around it.
Listen
Excerpts from productions made here.
Nothing here yet for that. Ask us — there is more than what is on this page. Write to us →
Everywhere I Go — Rooby & Mr. Cherry Remix
0:003:14
ProductionArrangementMixingMastering
Early productions
These recordings sit on YouTube, SoundCloud and Bandcamp. The player only loads once you press play — data is then sent to that provider.
Who works on it
A seasoned team with more than twenty years in the music industry and sound production — numerous releases and productions for clients across many fields. Dan runs the studio, alongside two music producers and an audio producer for sound in video projects.
Founder & producer
Dan aka Mr. Cherry
Runs the studio and brings together what is made here. Behind the desk since 2012: music for Sookee, Blessed Child, Captain Gips, Msoke and Refpolk, releases through Springstoff and Audiolith — working as a beat producer under the name Forbiddan at the time. In 2011 a hip-hop rendering of Handel’s Acis and Galatea at Staatstheater Koblenz. The score for “Palmyra”, a 90-minute essay film. By day video and post-production at katsu.media — which is why sound and moving image are never far apart.
Raised in Yekaterinburg in an artist family, in Germany since 1997. First beats before studying media in Darmstadt, where a soundscape composition for a church interior earned him a master’s degree in 2015. Along the way a lot of work with young people: a CD with children from Manege Berlin, a musical of his own with pupils in Kyritz.
Work and discography
- “Palmyra” — essay film, 90 minutes
- Captain Gips — “Cap is back”
- Sookee — “D.R.A.G.”
- Refpolk — “Über mich hinaus”
- Refpolk feat. Sookee — “Mehr als genug”
- Julian Maier-Hauff feat. R0T0M0D — “Digging For Gold” (Forbiddan Remix)
- Berlin Boom Orchestra — “Retro” (Forbiddan Remix)
- Msoke feat. Julian Maier-Hauff — “Celebrate Summertime” (Forbiddan Remix)
- Music for Sookee
- Music for Blessed Child
- “Acis and Galatea” in hip-hop form
- “Plötzlich Zukunft”
- CD with young people from Manege Berlin
- Sound design for TRIBIT Audio
- Corporate video productions
- Video productions for education and public institutions
Producer
Yura „J.T.“
Psychedelic rock, beats and sound design. His own music as Menk — with an ear for what a track is still missing.
Work and discography
How it runs
So you always know where you stand — from the first message to the final file.
- 01
We listen
You send a demo or tell us what you have in mind. If the song does not exist yet, we start with the direction.
- 02
Setting the direction
We build a sketch. If it fits, we carry on — if not, we make the next one.
- 03
Go-ahead and deposit
Once the direction is set and we have agreed to work together, we sign the project contract. Signing makes 50 % due, the rest on handover. Nothing is owed before that.
- 04
Lyrics and melody
If you write, we wait for your words. If not, we introduce you to writers.
- 05
Production
Arrangement, recording, instruments. You get at most two work-in-progress versions along the way — enough to have a say without pulling the work apart.
- 06
Mix and master
We bring it into balance and make it ready for streaming. This is where the cherry goes on top.
- 07
Revisions
Two or three smaller changes are included. Anything larger we estimate first and agree with you.
- 08
Handover
You get your package. From there the recording is yours.
Rights and credits
Three levels, so the question does not need renegotiating on every project.
- 01
Service
Mixing, mastering, feedback.
- Fee and credit
- No authorship in the work
- 02
Producing your song
Your finished song, produced and arranged by us.
- Fee and credit
- No share in the composition
- 03
We write the music
Melody, harmony, beat from scratch.
- Fee plus a share
- Split sheet before release
Service
- The recording
- Stays yours. We work on it, we do not receive it. The processed version belongs to you alone as well.
- The composition
- Untouched. Mixing and mastering are craft applied to a finished piece — they create no authorship in melody, lyrics or harmony.
- Credit
- We are glad to be named for the mix or the master. It is a request, not a condition, and it carries no share.
- Registration
- We register nothing. Whatever you filed with your collecting society or label stays exactly as it is.
- Afterwards
- Release it, license it, sell it, put it in a film — none of that needs to come back to us.
Producing your song
- The recording
- Passes to you in full with the fee — unlimited in time, territory and use. No exploitation needs our consent.
- The composition
- Stays yours. Here arrangement and production carry out your idea; they do not make us co-authors, as long as the music itself comes from you.
- What we play
- What producers and musicians contribute to this recording is settled with the fee. No ongoing claims arise from it.
- Credit
- We are named as the production, with the names of everyone involved. Again a request, not a condition.
- Registration
- We do not register as authors. If anything is to be filed for the recording itself with the neighbouring-rights society, we agree it in writing beforehand — never quietly.
We write the music
- The composition
- This is where co-authorship arises: whoever writes melody, harmony or beat is a co-author. Under German law that cannot be bought out — copyright itself is not transferable.
- Split sheet
- So before release we put in writing who wrote which share. It is the basis for the collecting-society registration, and the reason there is no argument later.
- The recording
- As with every production: it passes to you with the fee. The share concerns the composition only, never the recording.
- What the share means
- It concerns the writer royalties collected for the composition. We take no part in your income from sales, streaming or licensing of the recording.
- How much
- It follows how much actually comes from us, and it is settled before the first note — not once the song is finished.
This holds for every level: we show nothing without your consent — not even as a reference. Third-party samples and recordings must be cleared before they go into a production. What binds in the end is the contract; this overview is the starting point for it and is not legal advice.
What you get
- The finished master
- The instrumental
- Instrumental with backing vocals
- Stems on request
Project files stay in the studio — they belong to the craft, not to the result.
Check your material yourself — free
Drop a file here and you see at once whether it meets the points above: format, sample rate, bit depth, size, headroom and clipping. It saves the round where we ask you for a new export.
If you send material
So your session becomes a mix without detours.
- WAV or AIFF
- 44.1 or 48 kHz
- 24 bit or 32 bit float
- No more than 100 MB per file
- At least 6 dB of headroom
- No limiter, no clipping on the master bus
- Readable track names, every track the same length from the project start
If you send stems
The project name belongs in every file name, not just in the folder: a stem is called “01_Kick.wav” everywhere. If two sets end up together, one silently overwrites the other, and nobody can tell afterwards what belonged to what.
Project_No_Track.wav
- Sookee_DRAG_STEMS_48k24/
- Sookee_DRAG_00_RoughMix.wav
- Sookee_DRAG_01_Kick.wav
- Sookee_DRAG_02_Snare.wav
- Sookee_DRAG_08_LeadVox.wav
- Two-digit number, no gaps, starting at 01 — it sets the order
- Track names short and always the same: Kick, Snare, Hats, Bass, Keys, Gtr_El, LeadVox, BackVox, FX
- Number several tracks of a kind (Synth_1, Synth_2), sides go last (_L, _R)
- Only A–Z, 0–9, underscore and hyphen — no spaces, no umlauts, no special characters
- Sample rate and bit depth once in the folder name, not in every file
- A mixdown as 00_RoughMix — it then sits ahead of the stems without disturbing the numbering
Whether a track really starts at the beginning of the project cannot be seen from a file. So we check that all tracks are the same length — that covers the case in practice.
Revisions
Included
- Levels of instruments and vocals
- Adjusting reverb and delay
- Individual instruments louder or quieter
- The mix overall brighter or warmer
- Small changes to the stereo image
- Timing and pitch on specific vocal phrases
Quoted separately
- Re-recording a vocal or an instrument
- Swapping several sounds
- Changing the arrangement, adding or removing parts
- Changing the structure, length or order
- Changing key or tempo
- A complete remix
Anything beyond that we estimate first. You learn the cost before it happens, never afterwards.
Discretion
Ten principles every person working here is bound by.
We do not confirm that you are with us. We do not confirm that you were with us. We do not even confirm that anyone enquired. Unless you say otherwise, this project did not happen as far as the outside world is concerned.
A message to us is a business matter, not content. We post no screenshots, we quote nothing, we do not pass on who got in touch. That holds even if we end up not working together.
We publish nothing about you or your project before you have released it — in writing, for a specific post, on a specific channel, at a specific time. Withdraw the release and the post is offline within 24 hours.
No blurred photo from the control room. No location in a story. No emoji that is meant to mean something. Hinting is publishing — only slower.
No private recording devices are used during your session. Photos and video happen only when you commission them. We point that out to anyone you bring along, too.
Sessions, stems, takes, work-in-progress — none of it leaves the studio without your instruction. We publish nothing without your consent, use nothing as demo material, nothing for teaching, nothing for showreels. What we contributed ourselves is governed by the contract, not by who holds the files: which rights you get is set out under “Rights and credits”.
What you cut no longer exists for us. No anecdotes about the version that did not make it. No “funny stories from the studio”. Not in five years either.
Project data stays on encrypted systems cleared for the project. Share links go only to named recipients, password-protected and with an expiry date — never into open folders. We use AI tools on your material only with your consent.
Engineers, assistants, session players, stand-ins: all work under the same confidentiality agreement, with a contractual penalty, with no end date beyond the project. Discretion here is not a matter of sympathy but of signature.
Should anything get out despite all this, we tell you immediately, correct it at once, and do not defend ourselves in public at your expense. Trust shows in how someone handles their own mistake.
Newsletter
A few times a year: new releases, what was made in the studio, who was here, what we learned. No weekly offers.
You will first receive an email with a confirmation link. Only after that are you on the list. How we handle your details is set out in our privacy policy.
Talk to us
Tell us about your project — or simply send your demo. We come back with an estimate of the work and the time it needs, and then we put a cherry on top.
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