Google taps 29-year-old producer to create Year in Search song
Peter CottonTale and a group of Black producers, engineers and artists created the song 'Together'
It looks like Google is trying to uphold its commitment to diversity.
The company enlisted music producer, Peter CottonTale, 29, to create a song for its Year in Search campaign. The producer says over 80 Black engineers, artists and producers came together to make the song called “Together,” per Business Insider.
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“From our first call, it was clear he was inspired and knew exactly what he wanted to make,” said Patrick Marzullo, Google’s head of production. “We provided the Search data and it only took him a few days to show us the first signs of his magic in a demo.”
“All the stars aligned on this collaboration with Peter CottonTale,” said Marzullo. “The tone and story he wanted to tell through music aligned perfectly with our vision for the film, so from there it was easy to give him the time and space to do what he does best.”
CottonTale, whose real name is Peter Wilkins, is a Grammy-winning artist and known for working with Chance the Rapper. He chose actress Cynthia Erivo, the Chicago Children’s Choice, and Chance the Rapper to collaborate on the song that debuted on the website’s homepage on Wednesday.
The song was designed to sum up 2020, something that CottonTale acknowledged was a challenging feat.
“Trying to make a sound that culminates 2020 … was honestly way too sad,” he told Insider. “Because for a lot of people [the year 2020] sounded like loss, or it sounded like a lot of challenges in their personal lives.”
So instead he chose to “write the optimistic view of how we will make it into 2021.”
CottonTale wanted to make sure the song included a powerful female vocalist.
“We knew we wanted a female voice,” said CottonTale’s manager, Binta Niambi Brown. “We felt like the vocalist needed to be somebody who actually exudes the best of being a diva, and that’s Cynthia.”
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Google also committed to donating $15K to the Merit School of Music and $35K to the Chicago Children’s Choir.
Google still struggles to meet its commitment to diversity. In 2020, according to Fortune only 3.7% of the company’s employees were Black.
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