Riverwest recording studio Hi-Five hosted their monthly “networking jam” Wednesday evening, bringing dozens of Milwaukee creatives together for drinks, exchanges of business cards, social media plugs, and musicians of all backgrounds to jam out.
“Everybody is coming together to create these moments,” studio owner Ryan Rosmann said. “These are talented people from every walk of life. People always come up and thank me for doing this, but I’m not doing anything. We’re all doing this!”
According to Rosmann, the greatest success of these networking sessions is watching artists he records bring on artists they met while at Hi-Five to collaborate.
“That’s why we’re doing it. A super talented artist met another talented artist and made their record better. How incredible is that?” Rosmann said with pride.
Each networking jam is free of charge and open for anyone interested in checking out Hi-Five and its space.
“These events aren’t about making money. That’s not what we’re doing here,” Hi-Five Director of Marketing Daniel Zambrano said. “People that don’t know each other pick up instruments and jam. People go into the control room and play beats or rap. It’s seeing all of that happen in the moment, but also seeing it taken outside this event.”
The popular artist hub also had some groundbreaking news to share. Save the date – Friday, March 29th. Hi-Five is sponsoring a “Top 5 Live” Turner Hall concert.
“We’re taking a risk, and we’re doing it right,” Rosmann said. “We’re gonna sell eight-hundred tickets. They’ll have no choice but to pay attention to what we’re doing.”
Headlining the show is none other than R&B artist Ammorelle, whose birthday was also Wednesday. She was not aware of this news until the announcement. What a terrific birthday surprise indeed.
Additional artists on the bill include Will Pfrang and the Good Land Gang, Mo City, Bando, and more.
Ammorelle is also the protagonist of a documentary about Milwaukee’s growing music community titled “Zero Undiscovered,” which is still in production. The trailer dropped this past December on Hi-Five’s Facebook page.
Filmmaker and Digitus Media co-founder Eric McCambridge is directing Zero Undiscovered. The idea came about when himself and Zambrano were shooting the web series “Hi-Five Fridays” and decided they’d make a film about Milwaukee’s creative scene that would double as McCambridge’s senior film project. In the film, Ammorelle is taken under Hi-Five’s wing and is mentored into bringing her music career to the next level.
“I wanted to tell a story about everyone here, but it’s impossible to have an interesting movie when you’re constantly getting to know the characters,” McCambridge said, “so I decided I wanted to tell the story through one artist’s journey, and we ended up picking Ashley “Ammorelle” Smith. Daniel showed me a song of hers, and I just felt I was meant to hear it.”
McCambridge brought fellow film producer Marissa J. Williams onto the project, and has a crew of about eight additional individuals. For McCambridge, it has become a creative family, and so much more than a school project.
The doc’s crew filmed Wednesday’s event specifically for the production, which Zambrano emphasized made it important for the energy to be there.
“Up to six cameras were going around all night,” Zambrano said. “Two of them were very expensive.”
“I can see this movie coming together before my eyes and it’s a magical feeling,” McCambridge said.
McCambridge has planned to launch a crowdfunding campaign to help bring the documentary come to life. A release date is yet to be announced.
Tickets for the Turner Hall show go on sale Friday, March 1st.
“Let’s make it so there’s zero undiscovered, starting in Milwaukee,” McCambridge said.
