One of your recent big successes together is ‘Halo’. Before it was
recorded by Beyoncé it was reputed that it was first offered to Leona
Lewis but she was too busy to record it …
That is not true. I’ll tell you exactly how it was. Ryan was on tour with his
band OneRepublic and he ruptured his Achilles tendon and had to go to the
hospital in Detroit to get surgery. The day after that they cancelled the tour
and flew him back to Los Angeles.
On his first day back in L.A. I was going to take over some food and hang
out with him. When I got there, he was like, “Dude, we should write. We
should write a song,” and I’m like, “Well, you’re not supposed to be writing.
You’re supposed to be in bed.” Eventually we ended up in his studio and,
with him on crutches, we wrote ‘Halo’.
The idea was always, “Let’s write a song that embodies Ray LaMontagne.”
He has a song called ‘Shelter’, which is beautiful. And it’s a song to this girl
which is like, “I will always shelter you.” And I said, “We should write a Ray
LaMontagne ‘Shelter’ kind of song for Jay-Z and Beyoncé.” Ryan then
started playing some angelic chords. I said, “What about ‘Halo’?” Three
hours later we had ‘Halo’ done.
We sent it to Jay Brown, and an hour after that he put it on hold for
Beyoncé.
A month later, we were still waiting to hear back from them about when
Beyoncé was going to cut the song, and we were getting a little nervous.
So, Ryan sent the song to Simon Cowell (Read the HitQuarters interview
with Cowell here) and said, “Look, we’re not sure what’s going on. This song
is on hold for Beyoncé right now, but if for some reason it doesn’t end up
being cut by her, are you interested in it for Leona Lewis?” And Simon said,
“Yes, I want it. I want it right now! I don’t care that Beyoncé is on hold. I
want it now!” And Ryan said, “Woah! Woah! Woah! It’s on hold for Beyoncé.”
So, Simon got upset after Beyoncé took it, and I don’t know if it was Simon
but somebody leaked the story that it was originally for Leona. It was
originally for Beyoncé. We offered it to Leona as a backup to Beyoncé, and
unfortunately for Leona, Beyoncé took it.
http://hitmakerscasting.com/docs/HitQuartersEvanInterview.pdf
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Beyonce’s “Halo” was inspired by Ray LaMontagne’s “Shelter”Evan Bogart, who was still working as a booking agent at the time, was writing with OneRepublic’s Ryan Tedder, who was home nursing a ruptured Achilles tendon which has caused him to cancel his band's tour. Bogart was enamored with Ray LaMontage’s song “Shelter” and wanted to write a song that conveyed that same feeling. “Three hours later, we had the song done and four hours later, we had the word that she was going to cut it,” Bogart says. The song they submitted had no bridge, to even though Beyonce has agreed to cut it, they went back later and added a bridge that was Bogart’s tribute to LaMontagne. Don’t recognize it in the final version of “Halo?” For good reason: “When Beyonce recorded it, she ripped it out and replaced it,” Bogart said with a laugh.
Read more at
http://www.hitfix.com//news/adeles-someone-like-you-beyonces-hits-stories-behind-the-songs?full_site=true#xdFqlHOvCLmM4EQE.99 
