A rock 'n' roll bolthole

Socialite Denise Rich lives a schizophrenic life. By day, she is a deep-pocketed fundraiser for the US Democratic Party and a tireless philanthropist, running the Gabrielle's Angel Foundation for Cancer Research in honour of her late daughter, who died of leukaemia at just 27 in 1996. But Rich moonlights as a riff-loving rock'n'roll chick who has had a hand in writing hits for everyone from Celine Dion to Aretha Franklin - and has snagged multiple Grammy award nominations in the process.

Nowhere is her double life more evident than in her homes. In each of them, from her chalet in Aspen to her penthouse in New York and even her 157ft yacht, Lady Joy, Rich has installed a sizeable, professional-grade recording studio. "I've always had them wherever I've gone. On the boat, writers can come on, we can record music and do everything - it sounds like a really good demo."

While the ocean-going set-up includes keyboards and consoles and a Crestron-based control system with a multi-room video server, the multimedia complex at her sprawling New York home opposite Manhattan's Plaza Hotel is even more impressive. "The most important thing is a really good sound system - that is just major and I'm always updating mine. I just installed a full-blown console, which is state of the art."

But although few Upper East Siders would relish having a recording studio among their upscale apartments, Rich has never received complaints. "My neighbours in New York have never heard a word from the recording studio - the walls are all soundproofed and there's nothing on either side of me or above. The floor is soundproofed too."

In fact, her first apartment in New York was far noisier than this studio-equipped penthouse. "That was really tiny - an apartment with three of us where two of us were sharing one room, on First or York Avenue. But I was very proud, I thought it was incredible that very tiny apartment," she says. "I think the beauty of not always having had everything so fabulous is that you don't get jaded."

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Rich has always poured her creative instincts into writing songs, doubtless one of the reasons she moved to New York four decades ago from Massachusetts, where her father, Emil Eisenberg, was a successful shoe mogul. It was the era of songwriting factories such as Tin Pan Alley, where women such as Carole King and Ellie Greenwich were writing lucrative hits. Not long after arriving, Denise met and married Belgian-born commodities trader Marc Rich in 1966 and the pair was soon living a country-hopping life, with homes in New York, Spain, Switzerland, London and the Hamptons. The couple (who separated in 1996) had three children, Gabrielle, Daniella and Ilona, an artist now married to the dealer Kenny Schachter.

It is Schachter who steers Denise's own collection and oversees the installation of art - a personal passion - across Rich's homes. He even masterminded the displays of artwork by Peter Max and Paul McCartney that now festoon her favourite bolthole, Lady Joy.

Rich's nautical obsession dates back to her childhood. "When I was young I used to go to Cape Cod and my uncle used to take us out on his boat. It was an incredible experience. Once, our boat passed Honey Fitz, John F Kennedy's boat. I was very little but so blown away. I said from that moment: 'I want to enjoy the world, it looks so beautiful from a boat'. That's what I love about boating, pulling into different ports and cultures."

The onboard recording studio was one quirky addition but it is the pole she had bolted on to one deck for impromptu pole dancing classes that is most unexpected.

Rich is notorious for throwing lavish parties at her penthouse in New York, whether for fun or fundraising, and wanted her floating home to be just as party-friendly. It is no surprise that she has adjusted the set-up to accommodate live music. "I created a special stand on the Jacuzzi so that the DJ could stand on top of it. And on the main deck, the upper deck, I can seat 50 people.

Her floating home is not just geared to her guests; it's also an intimate place where Rich can contemplate and decompress. "On the fly bridge deck, I have a sofa that goes from one length of the boat to the other so at night you can sleep on it, lie on it, look at the stars. Coming into port, sitting out on deck is so beautiful and very romantic."

Rich's dual lives of social hostess-cum-liberal fundraiser and songwriter-for-hire only truly merge once a year, at her chalet in Aspen. "I do a writers' camp there where I bring a lot of songwriters together with [recording] artists and we spend three to four days in the house."

She pours out her creative impulses in Aspen, away from the constraints of what's expected or proper. "I was very lucky. I found a chalet with beautiful views of the mountains, very cosy and warm - my homes are all like that but especially Aspen, which is very family-oriented." She finds songwriting easiest in Colorado. "Aspen is very spiritual, the Yucca Indians have burial ground there, so there's a lot of feeling," she confides. "I write a lot when I go to Aspen. One song I just wrote looking at the mountains and the view. I was so inspired by the sky." Its title is all too fitting for the globe-trotting, house-hopping, identity-swapping Rich: "Home Away From Home".

For more information on Gabrielle's Angel Foundation, go to www.gabriellesangels.org. The next annual fundraising ball is on October 21 2010

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