Preserving the jam with Berlin's Cassette Head Sessions

Taking place every Wednesday at 90mil in Friedrichshain, Cassette Head Sessions has become one of the most popular nights in Berlin, where improvisation melds with contemporary soul, jazz and funk. It’s a meeting ground for standout musicians, anchored by one of the finest in-house bands in the city. Throughout the night, local talents guide the musical journey to far out places, all thanks to the night’s open policy that allows anyone to perform with the in-house band.

At the heart of the Cassette Head Sessions are Hal Strewe, Tim Granbacka and Nir Sabag, an international group of multi-instrumentalists dripping with expertise. The band came together a few years before the pandemic, holding weekly jam sessions in the basement of a DVD-shop-cum-bar in Kreuzberg. From booking events to playing festivals, hosting free flow sessions, releasing records and running an online video series, it appears there’s no tune this trio can’t play. The Berliner caught up with the Cassette Head Sessions team to press rewind and hear their story from the top.

Tell me, how did the Cassette Head Sessions start?

Tim Granbacka: The core crew is us three, with extras who we collaborate with and we also help to book and manage things. Nir moved here from Israel 11 years ago and Hal moved here from Australia at around the same time. We met through music and were all playing in different bands. Luckily, we all came together and got tight around the time we started doing jam sessions in the basement of Filmkunstbar Fitzcarraldo in Kreuzberg.

Hal Strewe: Here we realised there was this cool energy in the room, and it was a fun way to play every week and meet new people. This place had its own magic. People wouldn’t expect to find music in a DVD store with a live band playing into the night. A big part of the charm was having different featured acts every week and then connecting with different parts of the community through that. We then started to record the artists that came down and played with us onto cassette, hence the name. We also uploaded the sessions to YouTube. It was like a lo-fi Tiny Desk session. What was exciting for us was capturing takes and mistakes, like you would have in old soul records.

It must have been a really exciting time for you all. Did anyone particularly notable ever come through and join a jam?

HS: Throughout those sessions, we had RC & The Gritz play down there – this band from Houston that used to play with Erykah Badu. Moses Yoofee used to come down all the time in 2018. I think he even met his band there. I also met Yannik from Jembaa Groove in the Fitzcarraldo basement, and now we’re playing together. So many people came and jammed with us down there, and now their careers are going in such a nice direction.

… there’s such a vibrant young community of rappers, singers and musicians who see the world differently – it’s really exciting.

I see you also played a few sessions at Tempelhof. How did that come about?

HS: During Covid, we had to stop the in-store sessions, and then there was this weird grey area about what you could do. Basically we ran some power from the toilets 100 metres away and set up on the basketball court with some bands and DJs, booked a bunch of our friends, got some food and just made a block party with around 400 people. It was a crazy day and that made us realise what’s possible when you bring the right people together. I don’t think you could get away with that now.

Where are the sessions based these days?

Nir Sabag: Now we’re at 90mil, and have been there for a year now. Here we have this great space where we can set up on the floor [where audience members are] standing literally next to the instruments. It creates this space where anyone who wants to play with or sing with the band doesn’t have to go through a barrier. It’s a free-flowing exchange, and that is why people like it. Also, it being a community run-venue as well, and not being corporate really helps. We’re lucky that there’s still a venue like this in Berlin.

It’s been a learning curve for us. In the beginning, we would play the opening set and that sets the mood. Then people would come up and grab the mic, the set would evolve and people do their own thing. There’s a fine line between letting people do what they want and maintaining that quality, but we never run into the problem of not having enough quality musicians in the crowd.

Would you say Berlin is going through a jazz renaissance?

HS: The scene is definitely growing and a lot of people are doing it at a high level. If we go and play a gig somewhere else like in London, people there are talking about the Berlin scene. What’s happening here is really interesting. There has been a jazz scene here for a really long time, but over the past few years the sound has become broader. It’s more of a spiritual thing. It’s how you reflect the times you live in in a more spontaneous and human way, with less filters through the music. You can play anything, you can make people dance, and it communicates with current times. Berlin is going through a process of acknowledging what jazz is, departing from this old museum jazz into something more contemporary. Plus, there’s such a vibrant young community of rappers, singers and musicians who see the world differently – it’s really exciting.

… we never run into the problem of not having enough quality musicians in the crowd.

What do you think is propelling the growth of this scene?

NS: There’s been a shift back towards live instrumentation. I’ve seen more musicians wanting to play traditional electronic music with live instruments. A lot of those kids playing live instruments have grown up listening only to electronic music, and you have this mad crossover. There’s also a lot of female instrumentalists as well, which you don’t see that often. Now in the jam we have women playing bass, drum, keys – and they’re killing it! Of course, the city is also becoming more international too.

In general, people enjoy live music more than they used to. Even when you turn on the radio, you can hear it. And [with] big artists touring now. I don’t know if the growth is unique to Berlin, but you can definitely feel it: something is happening.