Jake Hanner met the future lead singer of his band a few hours after she was born. He was disappointed she was a girl and cried. Eighteen years later, Jake got over it, and he and sister Casey decided to start a band. “We didn’t grow up listening to a lot of the same music,” explains Casey, “but when we started writing together, we realized that we approached creating music in the same way.” The brother sister duo also quickly realized that their shared upbringing could translate to solid pop tunes.
Casey sings and plays an old black and white Silvertone guitar while Jake H plays drums, triggers samples from his octapad, and sings backup. Bassist Jake Churton, the studied musician of the group, entered the picture when brother and sister decided to complete their live band. “One day the guy we hired to play keyboard couldn’t make it to practice,” remembers Jake H, “So Jake C started playing the lead keyboard lick with his bass. Casey and I just looked at each other and both knew we had found our third member.” After shooting down Casey’s idea to name the band “Casey and the Jakes,” they became Donora.
