Leyton Benta; Staying Authentic in the Music Industry

BY DAVID MYLES

Leyton Benta is a young, 25 year old multi-award winning artist, songwriter, and actor based in London.

Wanting his music to transcend generations, and a multitude of different backgrounds, Leyton is cautious of having his music curtailed into a specific genre, but describes his music as ‘’Definitely around the Soul, the R&B, the Funk, Pop. There is a bit of jazz, but I wouldn’t give it a genre because I am versatile when it comes to my work.’’ Leyton is enthusiastic to reference artists such as Marvin Gaye, Prince, James Brown and Luther Vandross as being key to his development.

Upholding his integrity, and striving to display his true self is something that Leyton prides himself in. “I am here to break away from the norm, to do what is authentically me without selling myself short.’’

Over the course of his musical career, Benta has been approached by at least four record labels; the first record label offer came when Leyton Benta was just 13 years old. Reflecting on why he has refused to sign with a label thus far, Leyton declares that, “There is always something hidden in between the lines. They could throw a bunch of money, 50 million dollars; you could have this right now, but it is a matter of how it is going to change you, because what is between that?’’

Having a formidable team is important when deciphering whether a label offer is sincere or not. ‘’Luckily enough I had people to review it (label offer contracts). They printed out the pros and cons and there was more cons.’’

Photo: Kyran Jamal

While Benta is completely open to label offers, his strong stance and commitment to making music of substance keeps him disciplined in his mission to ‘’Bring love and authenticity into music,’’ and ensure his ‘’Content, music and message,’’ has not been compromised.

Uncommon for artists who draw heavily on Soul & R&B influences, it would be the choir where Leyton Benta would realize his talent vocally. ‘’I started at the age of six; it was when I was being forced to be part of a choir at Vicar’s Green Primary School (Ealing/Wembley border). Here is the thing; I didn’t know I could sing then, but I was always bought up on good music around me. I had to sing a song called “In the Bleak Mid-Winter which was for a Christmas concert. I felt something good inside me, but didn’t know I could sing.’’

Subsequently, by the age of nine, Leyton Benta had his first recording session singing the chorus in a song for his older brother. Three years later, Benta released his first mini album. ‘’It wasn’t anything majorly distributional. It was something that I produced and wrote on a software called Fruity Loops at the time.’’ This gave Benta the opportunity to explore different styles of music, but even at the age of 12 he was always into the ‘’old-school/new-school kind of thing.’’

Leyton is very passionate about social change, and young people. In 2011, he performed at the Descendants (youth arts charity) Annual Dr John Roberts CBE Achievement Awards, and his latest appearance was in 2018 around the time of his song ‘Release’ which is about special needs children. “I thank Margret Noel (founder of Descendants) because I have had the opportunity to contribute to youth groups before by giving a word of motivation, or performing some songs, and acting with them. I like to do things that have to do with humanity and community.’’

Throughout the years of being an independent artist, Leyton Benta has been the recipient of four awards. In 2016, he was bestowed with the BEFFTA (Black Entertainment, Film, Fashion, Television and Arts Awards) for ‘Best Unsigned Artist,’ as well as the 2018 ‘Platinum Star Award’ for StarPpl (based in Miami Florida). He placed first out of 66 countries in the world, for his recent award wins for ‘Best Singer Act’ and ‘Best Single Release’ for the DCS & Hotshots Recognition Awards 2019.

Leyton Benta’s forthcoming album will be out in early 2020. The video for ‘Release’ (Chrysalis Smile) can be viewed at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-e06qEB-FYs and you can check him out at his official website https://www.leytonbenta.com/.