FJ-HRN-3033

B-Roll: Brian working as DJ on “The Brian McKnight Show” radio show, him seated at DJ console reading, pan over to back drop, getting ready to go on air. CU on Brian as he speaks on air to the radio, he introduces Robin Thick and the crowd applauses, Robin Thick talks into mic, as Brian conducts interview, Brain talks into mic, CU on Brian as he listens as Robin Thicke speaks pan over to mic. and then pan over to Brian speaking, CU on console, the banner background pan over to Brian speaking, pan over to Robin Thicke speaking. CU Robin speaking, zoom out to Brian talking conducting interview.

B-Roll: Brian’s fingers the audio sound broad console, Brian gets ready to go back on air, he speaks into the mic. pan over to Robin Thicke, talking.

B-Roll: Brian plays the guitar and then switches up and plays “Christopher Robbins”, ends song with strumming of chords keys, goes back to playing.

Sound Bite: Brian McKnight – Recording Artist
I only, for optimum performance I need 4 hours of sleep and then 6 to 8 on those days, like on Sunday when I don’t have anything to do, but again when these opportunities are given to you either, you but everything you can into it, as long as you can, and hopefully you retire happy, or you don’t take them and regret that you didn’t, so point later on in life.

Sound Bite: Brian McKnight – Recording Artist
From the time I was about 16 all I ever wanted to do was do write songs and play in the NBA, I figured if I could write some songs, I’d satisfied that side, if I played in the NBA then I would satisfy my urge to be athletic, the NBA thing took longer than I anticipated, so I got my first publishing deal when I was 18 and I just started writing songs, I was writing 3 songs a day for my first 3 or 4 years in the business, not really wanting to be an artist but when you start sending your songs to all the record labels, they start asking who’s singing the demo’s? Who’s playing demo’s? Who’s writing them? When they realized it was me, then I started getting offered record deals and I signed with Ed Eckstein at Mercury, and I learned what it actually meant to be an artist that was back in the day when they were still doing artist development, it took my 3 years to put out my first record, and I wrote 150 songs, for that first album and it was frustrating and at the same time, he could have called Babyface, he could have called Jimmy and Terry Lewis to come and do a record on me, but he wanted me to grow as a producer, as a writer and as an artist, and for me to have my first record be mine, subsequently every record after that has been completely mine, written and produced pretty much by me, and uh, you just learn that this business changes and either you go with the changes and adapt to the environment or you will be gone and I’ve managed to stick around for 12 CD’s.

Sound Bite: Brian McKnight – Recording Artist
Before “Chicago”, I did one other production that was a traveling production called “Cheaters” with a company out of Houston, it was different because that show I wrote the music for, and I was in the starring role, it was more of an urban based kind of feeling sort of like Tyler Perry along those same lines, when I got called to do Chicago, I realized that’s Broadway, that’s top of the food chain,
OC: That’s Kander and Ebb
Brian: Yeah, and it’s “Chicago” a show that everyone knows, millions have people have gone to see, they know these characters, they know Billy Flynn they know what they expect from him, so it was a daunting sort of task to go in there and I realize that my mother and her siblings grew up in the 40’s and 50’s and who had all the musical talent in the world, because they were black did not have the opportunity to perform on Broadway, so there was no way, I was going to say no, if just for them to be able to live vicariously through me and all my aunts and uncles came to see me and when I was in the show, and I learned what it was like to do on a daily basis, 8 shows a week, on Broadway, for an international audience of people coming in and out, it was truly an amazing experience, the family environment of that cast, I have friends now from that cast that I will have the rest of my life

Sound Bite: Brian McKnight – Recording Artist
The very first show that I was ever on was The Arsenio Hall Show, and the thing that was great about Arsenio’s show was that he had the greatest variety of people on that show, it didn’t matter what color they were, it didn’t matter what they were doing, it didn’t matter how hot they were or not, he just put together a show that too me, sort of reached out to everyone, and I’m not saying that these shows that are out there now don’t do that, but there’s certain things you wont see on these shows, my show is a show for everybody else, it’s show that’s not so much talk and not so much, sort of like to break the mold, so I’m probably not going to come out and do a 5 minute monologue and try to be funny necessarily, even though I am very funny, by the way, that’s not going to be the case, we’ll definitely give people a look behind the velvet rope, any time you go to one of these clubs in West Hollywood, you see people waiting outside all night, they’ll never really get the idea what it’s like to have that sort of VIP treatment, with the guests, with the musical acts, to be able to talk to them in a way and give them that sort of slice of life and that’s what I’m going to offer.

Sound Bite: Brian McKnight – Recording Artist
This album that I’m making now, is the first album that I’m making at home, you know, I’ve left the studio, I have everything set up at the house, and with the election, the economy and Obama, some of the songs I’ve written are really about the state of world kind of things happening, I thought it was making my “What’s Going On” type of record when I was making it, and then I realized, you know what, there are people that are going to expect traditional Brian McKnight songs on this record, so I’ve sort of but that all together, yeah I think were getting close.

Sound Bite: Brian McKnight – Recording Artist
The new album, it definitely along the same line of all the records that I’ve done, um, it’s not as live as some of the other records, because now, I’ve got the latest and greatest computer technology, it may sound live, but I’m really melting the technology now, with, what I’ve always done, more so than I ever had, the integration, and this album, I’ve been working a lot with my son, my 19 year old son has now become Mr. Wizard, putting these computer things together and it’s amazing when I finish something and I give it to him, to sort of take it to the next level, he’s able to do that and come back with something that will blow my head.

Sound Bite: Brian McKnight – Recording Artist
I’ll tell you what happened, in New York on Sundays at Chas and Wilson’s a friend of mine used to do like an open mic. thing and all the stars would come down every Sunday, people would get up and sing impromptu and I got up to sing, my hit at the time was “Any Time” and Stevie was in the audience and he came up and he started playing “Any Time” he started singing it with me, and it was just one of those moments that’s like if I had to put that in the time capsule to play later on, nobody was filming that night, it should have been one of those things, there was another time when we were honoring Sting at the Songwriter’s Hall of Fame, we were in the rehearsal and I’m singing “Every Breath You Take”, Sting walks into the rehearsal grabs a mic. and starts singing harmony with me at the same time, that was another time mind blowing experience he comes in and just breaks up the microphone and starts singing, there’s been several of those mind blowing moments.