Meet Tushar Apte of T Apte in West Hollywood

Today we’d like to introduce you to Tushar Apte.

Thanks for sharing your story with us Tushar. So, let’s start at the beginning and we can move on from there.
I’m from Australia and moved to LA in 2012 to pursue a life in music. I didn’t have any contacts in the music business in Australia or the US when I’d moved here, but all I really knew was that LA was a global music city so a good place to start. Although I’ve ended up being a full-time music producer & songwriter – it’s a part of the industry that I had absolutely no idea even existed (in terms of being able to live from it financially, etc.) before moving to LA. When I’d first moved, I auditioned and played keyboards in a number of small touring bands and corporate bands, etc. I love films and film music and was also composing and submitting demos to every single competition or application for workshops. Even though I didn’t have an exact direction of where I wanted to land in the music business (I was still figuring out all the options!) I was really persistent in getting to know more. I would cold call publishers, managers, take meetings with friends who had friends in the music industry who they could connect me with, etc. I was gigging, but not making much consistently, so definitely had plenty of strange odd jobs you can only find in LA on Craigslist haha (that’s another article maybe).

My first major opportunity came through a friend who connected me with Manon Dave, a composer and record producer in London. We worked remotely for about two years mainly on commercials, short films and some remixes for UK acts. He had also worked in the record side of the business and eventually gave me an opportunity to co-produce a record called ‘Heavy’ with PJ Morton and Adam Levine. It was my first major credit and I tried using it to open as many doors as possible. That song didn’t change my life financially, I was definitely still struggling three years into my move to LA, but it would open alot of doors and contacts that I never had before. Long story short, and many small I was invited to a very prestigious writing camp in Toronto (they were looking for new talent to join some of the A-list writers on the camp and picked me) where I co-produced / co-wrote the song ‘Zero’ which would eventually become Chris Brown’s first single from his album ‘Royalty’. The song did pretty well on US radio and globally and really changed my life. Shortly after I signed my publishing deal at Warner Chappell and am managed by one of the best producer management firms in the business. I’ve since produced and written on major releases for BTS, Demi Lovato, Zayn, Nicki Minaj, Noah Cyrus and many more locally and overseas. I feel extremely lucky to have this life in music and I know it could only have happened from here in Los Angeles, which I certainly feel is my home now.

We’re always bombarded by how great it is to pursue your passion, etc – but we’ve spoken with enough people to know that it’s not always easy. Overall, would you say things have been easy for you?
I think the music industry is rarely a smooth road, even when you are on the ‘successful’ side of things. Starting out, I definitely struggled just to understand where I could fit in and how to get there. The business is very opaque and its often difficult to know who you should be knowing and also what people’s intentions are when you’re given opportunities. For the first year and a half, I slept on my cousins couch and have had many suspect dwellings on my way up haha. Aside from that, I also worked many odd jobs – from extras work to an admin job for a chain of wig shops (!) to WordPress admin for a Yoga company. In hindsight, a lot of these were actually great experiences where I got to know so many different neighborhoods and areas of LA. Also, even though they were ‘struggle times’ I always look back on them as being happy times since I was still making music. This was in comparison to my life in Sydney where I had a full-time corporate job and absolutely hated my lifestyle in spite of the ‘financial security’.

We’d love to hear more about your work and what you are currently focused on. What else should we know?
I am a music producer and songwriter. I work mainly in the pop music space and have had success in that world, having releases with Demi Lovato, Chris Brown, BTS, Cheat codes, Zayn, Nicki Minaj and many others, but I also do a lot of music composition work in film and television – recently I was lucky to have composed on ‘The Bobby Brown Story’ for BET which I scored with one of my musical idols, Kenneth ‘Babyface’ Edmonds.

One of the most important things I’ve learned is versatility and openness to different types of collaboration – it’s certainly been useful in allowing me to pivot within genres and formats in an industry that shifts and changes so quickly. I’m proud to have many great relationships in the industry and I think developing that part is extremely important to longevity in music.’

Has luck played a meaningful role in your life and business?
I think what we’re talking about re: luck is really when preparation meets ‘right place right time’. Sometimes you’re ready and in the right place, but the timings just not there for that one missing piece (maybe the right person seeing u play, etc.) to create the ‘lucky’ moment. In that regard, I’ve definitely had plenty of ‘lucky’ moments but I try to be as present and open to them happening continually by being prepared and getting better at my craft.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/springloaded/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/taptemusic/

Image Credit:
Matthew Burnett

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