Exploring Life & Business with Marwan of Treehouse Music

Today we’d like to introduce you to Marwan.

Hi Marwan, we’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
I picked up a guitar as a kid and fell in love with it. From taking it to school every day to playing on stages from SXSW to festivals, sharing rooms with Grammy-winning artists, and getting to work with legends like Breakestra and Bootie Brown of The Pharcyde, two of my personal favorite groups.

But the deeper I got into the industry, the more I noticed that the most meaningful moments weren’t on the big stages — they were the small ones. A kid finally hearing themselves play a song they wrote. An adult who hadn’t touched their instrument in fifteen years sitting down at a piano without flinching. Watching someone go from “I’m not musical” to “this is who I am.”

That’s the work I built my company, Treehouse Music around. Today I run two distinct sides of the practice from Pasadena and internationally: collaborative, accessible programs for kids — focusing on musical ownership rather than just technique — and high-touch, identity-level 1:1 work with adults.
The mission, in a sentence: help people transform their relationship with music — by making it collaborative and accessible for young learners, and by pursuing clarity and identity-level work for adults ready to finally make music a permanent part of their lives.

I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
It hasn’t been smooth, no. The music industry hands you a pretty narrow definition of success — chase tours, chase streams, chase recognition — and for years I tried to fit myself into that shape. The hardest part was admitting that the version of “making it” I’d been sold wasn’t the version I actually wanted.
Once I let go of that, the next challenge was building something honest in its place. Treehouse Music isn’t a music school in the traditional sense; it’s two distinct practices under one roof, with two very different audiences. Designing programs that are genuinely collaborative for kids — where they own their creativity, not me — took years of experimenting in real rooms with real groups. And on the adult side, I had to be honest that I’m not the right teacher for everyone. I only take on adults I’m certain I can transform. Saying no to people who weren’t in alignment with the work I am doing felt counterintuitive at first, but it’s the thing that lets the work go as deep as it does.
The other quiet challenge: most adults who come to me carry a story that they’re not musical, or not as talented as they wish they were. Someone told them that at age seven and they believed it for thirty years. The struggle isn’t technique. It’s identity. Helping people put that story down is some of the most rewarding work I do.

Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your business?
Treehouse Music is built around one idea: most people already have music in them — our job is to clear the noise around it. We do that two very different ways.
For kids, the work is collaborative and accessible. The hallmark of how we teach is creative agency — kids own the process. I can walk into a room of children with zero musical experience and lead them through writing a real, original song improvisationally in 45 minutes. That’s the standard.
For adults, it’s high-touch, 1:1, and identity-level. I work with returners and blocked players: people who used to play, currently play but feel stuck, or feel disconnected from music as part of who they are. I don’t take total beginners; I only take clients I’m certain I can transform. Music Alive, my free weekly Saturday call series, is the front door to that work. The arc of every conversation moves through three pillars: Intention → Identity → Expression.
What I’m most proud of, brand-wise, is how the work feels in the room. Kids leave with a sense of agency over their own creativity. Adults leave with a relationship to music they thought they’d lost. Same mission, two very different rooms.
If I had to put it on a single line: clear the noise. Find the music that’s already there.

What’s next?
There’s a lot I’m building toward right now, and it’s an exciting season. The big picture is continuing to grow Treehouse Music into a sustainable operation with impact that goes beyond me — both the kids’ programs and the adult side under the Music Alive brand.
On the kids’ side, I’m actively pursuing partnerships with schools, libraries, and community organizations in the LA area to bring collaborative music programs to more young people who might not otherwise have access. That outreach infrastructure is something I’ve been building deliberately to attract the types of partners that I find the most alignment with.
On the adult side, I’m expanding Music Alive — a bespoke 1:1 offer for adults with a prior musical identity who are ready to make music a real part of their life. I’m building out my own methods and refining them on the weekly calls and work with current clients to help see exactly who I can genuinely transform. That’s the work I care most deeply about.
On a personal side, I’m also continuing my Japanese language study, working toward JLPT proficiency — that’s a personal goal that’s been grounding and fun in the middle of all the business building.
What I’m most looking forward to is the moment Treehouse Music is fully self-sustaining — where the mission and the livelihood are completely aligned. That feels close.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://treehousemusic.netlify.app/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/marwan.music