Music Producer, Harmony, Talks Chris Brown, Beyonce & Bringing Back 90s R&;B

Super producer, Harmony “H-Money” Samuels (@HarmonyBOE) is a force to be reckoned with. The British native has taken the music world by storm and produced songs for some of the biggest names in the music industry including: Ne-Yo, Chris Brown, Brandy, Kelly Rowland, Fantasia, Maroon 5 and more. He has the special ability to make an artist feel “safe” with him and draw our their true feelings when they’re behind the microphone. His ability to help artists open up proves that Harmony is more than just a music producer and a businessman, but he is also the artist’s friend, counselor and confidant.

I recently had the change to sit down with Harmony and talk about his close relationship with Chris Brown, his love life, what he does to make an artist feel vulnerable behind the microphone and how he plans to bring back 90s R&B. Check out our interview below:

HelloBeautiful: You were born in the UK and but you came to America to pursue music. Tell me a little bit about that…

Harmony: I’ve been in music since I was four years old and that’s when I started to play my first instrument. I grew up in the church and I was a music director by the age of 12. By 15, I figured that production was where I wanted to be and was what I wanted to do. England is very small compared to the rest of the world, so it doesn’t have much space for producers (especially black producers).

HB: Do you find any differences from English artists and American artists?

Harmony: Oh, there is a total difference! Our accents for one, but besides that, England is very different in music just because music there is so small. Music is always crossing into each other like rock and pop and pop and dance and dance and R&B. It blends into one. But in America, music is more defined. You have urban artists, you have pop artists, you have the ones that can go in the middle. Also, Americans are more aggressive in the way they handle music which works perfect for me, I love it. Americans work so much harder in trying to make an impact in the world and with English artists, they’re okay to come out and just do well in England and never really expand.

HB: I noticed that you have a close relationship with Chris Brown that started around the time he was going through the incident with Rihanna. Since you worked on a few songs on his FAME album, I think it’s safe to say that you played a role in his come back. What do you think about all the media scrutiny  that Chris is receiving now for his love life? 

Harmony: The one thing I love about Chris is that if you want to know how he really feels listen to his album. Chris doesn’t hide his feelings, he lets you know. The only reason the media is even allowed to know anything about him is because he’s somewhat allowing us to know how he feels. The media is going to say anything, good or bad, and they’re going to go at him anyway. He’ll go behind the microphone and say exactly how he feels. Anybody who has an idea and wants to make an issue about it, they go ahead and do it. He just says, “I’ll say exactly how I feel on the mic”.  It’s inspiring to watch someone do that, to take all the scrutiny and go hard for what he believes in. It’s amazing! Even in his love life he’s like, “my love life is my love life. I’m going to sing about it and I’m going to talk about it and do it the way I want to do it.”  I respect him for that. It’s hard being in the industry and having your life put on blast everyday, so more power to him. That’s why I always support him, because he’s real honest with himself.

HB: If you could offer Chris Brown any advice man to man, what would you tell him?

Harmony: Keep your head up, keep going, and keep strong! No ones perfect! He got there for a reason. He’s doing this for a reason. So, I can’t take anything away from him and say he did something wrong. I make mistakes myself. I love the kid; he’s a special kid and anybody who works with him in the studio will say that. And like I said, it’s a shame that the media did what they did. Chris is a good man and he knows what he’s doing. He’s very strong, and working on this new album, he’s going to express it again and tell to the world how he feels.

HB: Speaking of controversy in the media, what do you have to say about the Presidential Inauguration and Beyonce being accused of lip syncing the National Anthem?

Harmony: I’ll say this, Beyonce, whether she lip syncs or not, we don’t have a right to say anything because its not like she can’t sing. She can prove it at any place and time. You can stop her in the middle of the street and say sing and she’ll blow you away! The girl can sing! No one knows what goes on behind the scenes. They might have wanted her to prerecord, we don’t know. I don’t even know if it was prerecorded. But people will lip sync; it’s a professionalism behind it. Not every person wants to sing live. It could be because artists are sick sometimes and they still have to perform. Sometimes it’s to make sure there is no mistakes or because of the programming. Regardless, if it was someone who couldn’t sing then it would be a different story. So the fact of the matter is, the girl can sing. She’s a phenomenal artist and she’s sold millions of records for it.

HB: What’s the biggest difference in working with a female music artist vs a male artist?

Harmony: Put it this way, for some reason I work better with female artists than male artists. Maybe because my most favorite people in my world is my mother and my sister. But other than that, I don’t know, but for some reason I connect with them. Like Fantasia, I connect with her and we did a whole album. Michelle Williams: whole album. Kelly Rowland, we did five songs on her album. So it’s like a connection. I guess I help bring out their vulnerability and I make them feel safe enough to be vulnerable and let them know that it’s okay to cry behind the microphone when your singing and it’s okay scream and let your feelings out. I’m not going to judge you on that or tell anybody. So, I think it’s knowing that they feel safe. They believe that the music is what they need and that’s what we do at the studio. We make the artist feel safe so they can be the best they can be and at the end of the day when the album comes out I bet you people will know why they sound so good. Like on Michelle and Fantasia’s album, they are really singing. They put their heart on their sleeve.

HB: Is it hard putting yourself in the mindset of a female when working with a female artist?

Harmony: You have to. It’s kind of weird because I’m a dude so in some way you have to sit back and be quiet and do a lot of listening and really understand why women feel like how they do, especially women in the industry. It’s a very strange but gratifying feeling when you sit down and you can understand and they are like, “that’s exactly what I mean and that’s exactly how I’m feeling!”

HB: You work with all these beautiful women, so are you currently dating? Are you single? What’s going on with your love life?

Harmony: I date music. My music is my lover right now. I date music because it’s easier

HB: Do you find that it’s hard to date? Could you date someone that’s not in the industry?

Harmony: Hell yea, its very difficult. Dating especially when you’re trying to do so many different things from albums to videos and films and scoring movies, it makes it so difficult to balance a love life. Trying to date someone in the industry is hard because they are trying to make it and you’re working as well and then dating someone outside of the industry, they don’t have an understanding of the lifestyle. So it’s very hard trying to balance both lives. I’m still young so who knows. I may fall in love one day.

HB: Any celeb crushes?

Harmony: I am big fan of “Scandal” so I’ll say Kerry Washington, that show is crazy!

HB: Describe your perfect Valentine’s Day playlist in 5 songs

• Destiny’s Child “Cater 2 U”
• Jodeci “Feenin”
• R Kelly “4 Play”
• SWV “Rain”
• Boyz 11 Men “End Of The Road”

HB: What do you want to be remembered by?

Harmony: I want people to say that’s the man that brought back R&B, like 90s R&B! I’m talking about Brandy, “Never Say Never”! I’m trying to start a record label right now called BOE which stands for Black Out Entertainment. We want to be the new “Jerry McGuire” in the industry where you don’t have to get screwed over but artist can be safe. Back in the day, Motown had great superstars and they took the artists from the studio to the stage. Now, not too many artists can go from the studio from the stage. Beyonce is one of them, Kelly is one of them, and there are a lot of other people I’ve worked with that can do it but as a whole, I don’t believe that many people have done that.  So for that reason, we’re trying to create our own mini Motown. We’re going into TV shows, clothing lines, and a lot of other stuff. But my real dream is to be an executive at a record label one day.

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