We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Sequoyah Cleveland a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Sequoyah, appreciate you joining us today. It’s easy to look at a business or industry as an outsider and assume it’s super profitable – but we’ve seen over and over again in our conversation with folks that most industries have factors that make profitability a challenge. What’s biggest challenge to profitability in your industry?

What I think is the biggest challenge to profitability in the music industry is what monetization of social media has done to music. It seems like TikTok has now become the monster in driving artists and songs into positions of success just from a 15-30 second clip with no understanding of the record as a whole. 90% of the time when I listen to those songs when they come out, the rest of that record is pretty disappointing. It seems that artists are now looking for social media fame rather than making music for the listener, and if you don’t conform to the industry’s standard of uploading videos of yourself on this app you are subject to discrimination and will never get the attention deserved even when your song is marketable and very enjoyable.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

I’m Cøya. I’m a singer songwriter from Albuquerque New Mexico living in Dallas Texas. My team is Highbros entertainment and we are signed to a label called Believe, based in Thailand. I got into music at a young age with piano and drums. In my late teens I started singing and progressed that into making a name for myself. I don’t really know what genre I would put myself in. I’m told I’m in a genre of my own quite often by fans and peers. Im very diverse. I make EDM, house, rnb, pop and hyper pop music. I’m most proud of the growth I’ve seen in myself over the years of my career. Each year there is always more steps to climb and each year I’ve made significant progress towards my goals of my first tour and eventually my first world tour. I’m proud of the songwriting I’ve done for many artists and not just from America. Lao, Thai and Korean artists as well. I don’t make music for social media, I write and make songs for people who genuinely have the love for sound and the ones who dive deep into the lyrical aspect of a songs too. I write about my life and experiences, but also have trained myself to step into the shoes of others and write about theirs as well. To be empathetic towards someone else’s experience and best put it down on maker and make it into an art specifically inspired by that person has become a new found happy place for me.

Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?

A lesson I had to unlearn is there really are no friends in this industry. Get your stems after every session, don’t share music to people that aren’t in your immediate circle or business and even then make sure you’re head is on tilt for the snakes in the grass. Don’t ever listen to promoters, they are scam artists. Everyone wants you money and everyone wants ti piggy back off your success. It’s the ruthless world of this game. you all have heard It many times but it is very true, the ones who held you down when you had nothing should be the same ones you share with when you got it all.

Can you tell us the story behind how you met your business partner?

How I met Remy my producer was in 2023 I think it was around April. I was brand new in Dallas looking for a home studio. A co-worker had mentioned he did music so I went to his studio to check it out. Over time at that studio and at work he kept mentioning this guy Remy who had a bunch of equipment at the studio but was never there. So eventually I asked to meet him. My coworker set up a session with him and off rip we connected. In that session we made a house beat from scratch which ended up being my first house track called Never Recover. It’s not released yet but will be soon. It’s crazy to me how Gods timing put me in that job at exactly the same time as this coworker that would introduce me to my new producer who I would travel across the world with to follow our dreams together.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.highbrosentertainment.com
• Instagram: @c.o.y.a_
• Twitter: @Coyaaaa1
• Youtube: Highbros Entertainment
• Soundcloud: Cøya

Image Credits

Lyly Norasignh