Quincy Jones emailed saying, 'Hey man, I need to have a word'

Jacob Collier grew up as part of the YouTube generation, filming himself in the family back room and layering vocal parts on Stevie Wonder covers and instrumentals. One of those videos reached Quincy Jones, who emailed: "Hey man, what’s going on with these chords?

I need to have a word with you." They began talking on Skype, Jones signed him to his label and became a mentor. As a child Collier listened to Joni Mitchell, Michael Jackson and Stevie Wonder, trying to count the instruments and analyse what worked. He had some formal education and sang classical music as a boy, but says he wasn’t a brilliant multi-instrumentalist; he played piano and experimented with a Casio keyboard full of percussion and bassoons to produce sounds he loved, such as the harp in Ravel’s piano concertos.

He made In My Room in three months on his laptop, looping instruments and manually layering vocal harmonies.

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