Just like many of us, this story begins with two college students hustling the downtown music scene. Zack Johnson and Derrick Brown were friends from high school, who both started out DJing high school parties. Zack focused on live events, while Derrick dabbled in live events, but found his niche in music production. After so many years of hard work that had gone into club DJing and bedroom music production, Zack had decided to re-connect with Derrick to merge their passions, skills and knowledge into creating a music school together. Zack was inspired from his experience teaching at Sarah Cover’s dance studio, Urban Dance Complex. They established The Lab in 2007, and within the first six to eight months, their DJ school sparked an interest in communities across Vermont. The Lab was “a safe place for kids to hang out after school, and work with music” says Zack.