What made you decide that music production is the career you want to professionally pursue? And who was the first artist you ever worked with?
I wanted to switch to music production from being a jazz pianist because I wanted to compose and produce mainstream music that would reach a wide audience. The first big artist I worked with was Destiny's Child. I did a song called "Fancy" on the "Survivor" album. Before that I worked with local Bay Area rappers.
As you mentioned, your first major break into the scene was via co-producing Destiny's Child's "Fancy" along with Dwayne Wiggins of Tony Toni Tone. How different was it from belting out songs all on your own?
Producing songs on my own is much different. Back then I was more of a beatmaker who had little to do with the final outcome of the song, or working with the artists one on one. Now, I am in full control of a song, from the beat, to the writing, to the vocal production, working with the artists to get the best possible performance, to finishing the production, and to the final mix.
Did you fancy any of the group members back then?
I thought Beyonce was cute.
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Firstly, can you explain how you got into hip hop and your journey into becoming a top level producer?
Basically, I was a classical and jazz pianist. I studied classical music when I was very young and went to Berkley College of Music and studied jazz in Boston. Then I basically, you know, after being a jazz pianist back in the Bay Area where I’m from, I decided I wanted to start doing beats and doing production, so I just got into it that way. The Bay Area is a very small place musically, and I got my beats to Dwayne Wiggins of Tony Toni Tone and then that led to a placement on Destiny’s Child’s ‘Survivor’.
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So I made a few tracks and they got to Dwayne Wiggins of Tony Toni Toné, who took a couple tracks to Beyoncé of Destiny's Child, because Dwayne Wiggins was the one who signed Destiny's Child to Sony/Columbia. And Beyoncé ended up writing to a couple of my tracks, one of which got placed on the "Survivor" album by the name of "Fancy".
Westcoast2k.Net - So that song you did for Destiny's Child got you the first big break?
J.R. - It was one of my first ones. I actually wasn't even credited as a producer, I was credited more as a writer and instrumentalist, even though the track was my track. But yeah, that was the first major label thing that happened to me.