The musical world is a little richer thanks to CMU’s recording label, White Pine Music.

“We exist to make recordings that we feel need to be made for scholarly or artistic reasons,” says Scott Burgess, executive producer.

Sometimes that includes CMU faculty and groups, such as CMU professors Steven Egler and Adrienne Wiley or the CMU Marching Band. Other times it includes emerging artists or musicians with a unique repertoire, such as the Harlem Quartet or Folias Latin Dance Project.

White Pine Music’s first release in 2003 compiled 30 years of historical recordings of traditional arts music at mid-Michigan’s Wheatland Music Festival. In the last five years, the recording label has produced 11 projects, with four more under way.

Burgess will travel to record artists on location. (Recent trips have included Chicago and New York City.) But he prefers the superior acoustics and piano quality in CMU’s own Staples Family Concert Hall.

“Our big challenge now is to develop White Pine Music into a sustainable concern,” Burgess says.

Until now, White Pine Music has been funded through internal CMU grants. Burgess hopes to build on this foundation with external funding.