Classical and pop music have more in common than you think — just ask producer Rogét Chahayed. “Classical music is the foundation of all the music we listen to today, when it comes to pop songs, R&B, any style of music, really,” he says.
The 33-year-old Los Angeles native, who is nominated for producer of the year, non-classical, at the 64th Grammy Awards and has worked with Top 40 favorites like Doja Cat, Halsey and Drake, has a unique knowledge of how the two genres overlap. He’s a classically trained pianist, having graduated from the San Francisco Conservatory of Music with a degree in piano performance. During school breaks, however, Chahayed would slip away to L.A., where he circulated in local bands and dipped into studio sessions.
That studio time eventually led to Chahayed meeting Melvin “Mel-Man” Bradford, a renowned producer with Dr. Dre’s Aftermath Entertainment. It wasn’t long before Chahayed was meeting Dre himself. “[Mel] surprised me one day and brought me to Dre’s studio,” Chahayed recalls from his Tarzana home studio, which he converted from a garage. “I wasn’t dressed for it. I wasn’t mentally prepared for it.” As Chahayed walked into the unmarked building, he saw Dre sitting behind a console. “Then he turned around, pointed at me and said, ‘I heard you’re nice on the keys.’”
Grammy-nominated producer Rogét Chahayed at his home in Tarzana.
(Christina House / Los Angeles Times)
As a kid growing up in West Hills, Chahayed never saw himself as a concert pianist, let alone a concert-pianist-turned-pop-producer. Born to a culturally blended family — Chahayed’s mother is from Buenos Aires and his father is from Damascus — Chahayed initially gravitated toward sports, skateboarding in particular. But his father had a passion for singing and was eager for his children to learn the piano, hiring a teacher out of the local PennySaver. (Chahayed’s sisters Andrea and Juliana are also musicians.) “I didn’t love it so much at first,” Chahayed admits. “I did it to make my parents happy.”
His parents filled the house with music. “I listened to Arabic music, Latin music, tango, Julio Iglesias, Luther Vandross, Raúl Di Blasio,” he says. “At the same time, I was listening to rap. I was learning about jazz. I was constantly being introduced to new sounds and styles.”
Chahayed’s agility on the keys and sponge-like facility in sound production earned him a permanent spot as Dre’s go-to keyboard player, a position once held by his childhood idol, producer Scott Storch. “For most of 2014, you could find me at [Dre’s] studio, working, playing keyboards, making beats and basically soaking …….
Source: https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/awards/story/2021-12-08/roget-chahayed-grammys-doja-cat