western tidewater living
MAJETTE, from page 12
and inspirational music as well, with his church roots continuing to show. “Even though I grew up in the church, I had a lot of musical influences from the older R&B generation,” he said. “As a kid, I was a huge Motown fan, so everyone else could be listening to the newer age music, but I was listening to Marvin Gaye, The Temptations, Gladys Knight and things like that, so it allowed me to have an old soul, I guess you would say. And I really appreciate that because I like to write music for everybody, because I feel like, ‘Hey, if this song is not a song that you like or particularly care for, I may have something else in my catalog that may be your favorite song.’” When writing music, L. Terrel draws upon his life experiences as well as those he is close to. He said his cousin once asked how he is able to write so many songs. “It’s one of those things (where) I’ve been doing it for so long now that if I don’t write it down, I have an overload of ideas and thoughts and things of that nature, so it’s like I almost have to write it,” L. Terrel said. As an independent artist, L. Terrel produces, mixes and masters his own music. “The hardest part out of the whole process, I would say, is just learning how to trust myself, especially when it comes to
the mixing and mastering part, because, of course, there is such a thing as ‘industry standard,’ and you want to make sure that whatever you create, before it goes out to the stores and Apple Music and Spotify and all of those different things, you want to make sure that you have the best sound,” he said. “So a lot of times, I spend the most work just going over the mix of the song, and I’ll run back and forth to the car stereo and different speakers, and I’ll hook my phone up, and I’ll play it on all the different speakers just to check my levels, and then I’ll play other songs that may sound similar to that song and make sure that my song is lining up with theirs,” he added. “So I would say that’s the hardest part. “The actual writing and recording part, that’s pretty easy for me because that’s something I’ve been doing all my life, but the mixing, that’s new, but I get better all the time, I would say.” Among the other career opportunities he has created for himself and his family in the entertainment industry, L. Terrel learned about the reality TV show “Survivalist” on a platform that he uses to find acting gigs. He noted that “Survivalist,” available on the BYUTV app, looks for families that want to compete against each other for
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a cash prize of $10,000 by doing what he described as a challenging hike through the woods, working their way up a mountain that climbed to around 11,000 feet in the air across a journey of approximately 16 miles. “‘Survivalist’ was the hardest thing I’ve ever done,” L. Terrel said, “and this is coming from a person who is an eightyear vet in the military as well. … We totally underestimated what Moab, Utah’s mountains were like. So it didn’t take us long to realize that we had overstepped our boundaries a little bit.” The show, which aired in May, was filmed at the end of 2020 and allowed opportunities for Majette family members to bond and persevere amid difficult circumstances. They got used to gathering firewood, eating out of bags and sleeping in 10-degree weather with wind that made it feel like it was below zero. But the experience added to the Majettes’ exposure and helped them raise the profile of Nagid House Entertainment, which they represented with their apparel. L. Terrel also has had the opportunity to be a jingle and theme song writer. “I work for a company called Odin Industries, and they’re out of Miramar, Florida,” he said. “They work with small businesses and things like that, and I’m See MAJETTE, page 14
Pictured on the set of the feature film “Family Thanksgiving” are, from left, Valerie Burgos, Tracy Mazyck, L. Terrel Majette, Jacob Jenkins, Imani Monae, Roderic Lee, William McKinney and Austin Freeman. Majette made his professional acting debut in this film, which also features four of his songs on its soundtrack.
