<\/p>\n
\u201cI didn\u2019t even meet him during \u2018Beauty and a Beat,\u201d recalls hit songwriter-producer Savan Kotecha, who co-wrote the Justin Bieber pop hit alongside Max Martin, Zedd and Nicki Minaj. \u201cI was in Sweden when [Justin] was in L.A. recording it. But he\u2019s super sweet \u2014 obviously a gifted, generational talent.\u201d<\/p>\n
Over the course of his over 20-year-long career, Justin Bieber is far from the only superstar Kotecha has written for. His credits include songs for Britney Spears, One Direction, Lizzo and Katy Perry. And after some time away to focus on his family (\u201cI was so deep in it and I felt like I was missing my kids\u2019 childhood\u2026 If I was in the middle of writing a song, I would be tweaking until two in the morning,\u201d he says), he returned to churning out hits. He co-wrote 2025 hits for Ed Sheeran (\u201cAzizam\u201d) and Tate McRae (\u201cIt\u2019s OK I\u2019m OK\u201d) among others.<\/p>\n
More from Billboard<\/strong><\/p>\n But his new music isn\u2019t the only thing making noise today. During Justin Bieber\u2019s headlining Coachella performance, during which he sang along to YouTube clips of his early hits \u2014 including \u201cBeauty and a Beat\u201d during weekend one \u2014 his music is finding its way back onto the charts. \u201cBeauty and a Beat\u201d is enjoying the biggest gains, topping both the Billboard Global 200 and Billboard Global Excl. U.S. chart 14 years after it first came out.<\/p>\n In the midst of the resurgence of \u201cBeauty and a Beat,\u201d Billboard<\/em> spoke with Kotecha about the story behind the song and the experience of having an old hit make a comeback with audiences new and old.<\/p>\n Take me back to the experience of writing \u201cBeauty and a Beat.\u201d Are there any particular moments from that songwriting process that stick out to you today?<\/strong><\/p>\n I remember [Max Martin] calling me saying he needed help with idea, and I remember him sending it to me. I remember sitting on my bed in my apartment in Stockholm working on it. After it was recorded \u2014 I was in Sweden at the time \u2014 [Max] told me that it went great.<\/p>\n I also remember when Scooter [Braun, Bieber\u2019s former manager] showed me the music video. I remember going to L.A., before I moved there, and I went to Scooter\u2019s old office in West Hollywood. That I remember, because I was like, \u201cOh my God.\u201d<\/p>\n And I remember when we got Nicki\u2019s verse and hearing the \u201cSelener\u201d line, because it was when all that stuff was happening. And it was so exciting \u2014 I mean, she\u2019s controversial now, but back then to get Nicki Minaj\u2026 We were just pop writers and to get Nicki Minaj on the song was like, \u201cWhoa.\u201d She just elevated it.<\/p>\n What is it like hearing a song you wrote performed by the artist for the first time?<\/strong><\/p>\n If it\u2019s good, it\u2019s magical. A lot of my biggest songs, I have been there during the recording. But, back in those days when I was in Sweden, like I am now, if we had a big artist in L.A. and if I was working with Max and he was there, I had to wait for the recording. And then you get it the next morning and it\u2019s so exciting. I remember doing \u201cDJ Got Us Falling In Love,\u201d recording Usher and going, \u201cOh my god.\u201d And then when Pitbull got on, going, \u201cOh my god, Pitbull\u2019s on it.\u201d Everything is just so exciting.<\/p>\n It brings back a lot, \u201cBeauty and a Beat\u201d being big. It really does. I\u2019m very lucky that things went great after and there were a lot of big songs. But it brings me back to the time when you had those few hits and you\u2019re still climbing in your career, and every single one is like, \u201cOh my gosh, I can\u2019t believe this.\u201d It\u2019s really fun to have something come back like this.<\/p>\n Were you at Coachella this year? <\/strong><\/p>\n No, I\u2019m too old and unattractive to be at Coachella.<\/p>\n How did you learn that the song was on the setlist? What was your reaction to seeing it?<\/strong><\/p>\n Like millions of people addicted to their phones, I wake up and the first thing I do is doom scroll. I woke up and I remember seeing clips of it. I was like, \u201cOh, that\u2019s fun.\u201d And then two days later when it was No. 3 globally, I remember sending it to Max [Martin], going, \u201cLook at this!\u201d And then the next day, it\u2019s No. 1. It\u2019s wild, super fun. I\u2019ve slowed down very heavily on songwriting the last five-six years to just focus on other things. But these old catalog songs are popping up and I\u2019m like, \u201cOh, that\u2019s really how that feels.\u201d It\u2019s really special.<\/p>\n What was your initial reaction when you saw \u201cBeauty and the Beat\u201d on the setlist?<\/strong><\/p>\n When he did the song at Coachella, I was like, \u201cWow, deep cut.\u201d And it did make me excited that a new audience was going to hear it, because those were the days where we really spent a lot of time crafting the songs. Every phonetic in the lyric was carefully fine tuned. I remember just on the lyric side, spending little bit more than a week everyday trying to crack what sounds best.<\/p>\n Why do you think of all the songs Justin performed that this is the one catching on?<\/strong><\/p>\n If I remember correctly, Max had the melody set and brought it to me to help. I remember it was a lot of work just getting everything, every part, to sound great. But those were the days when we used to do that, and really try and make things as bulletproof as possible. Now, some people do that but it\u2019s more of an emotion thing So what\u2019s nice to see is, from this whole amazing catalog, that\u2019s the one that\u2019s sticking. My kids weren\u2019t alive when that song came out, so they think it\u2019s a new song. Their friends are singing it at school in Sweden as if it\u2019s a new song. And we spent a lot of time making that song, so it\u2019s nice to see that it is appreciated even years later, and that it went to a new audience. They\u2019re like, \u201cOh, we like this. This is great,\u201d and it sticks.<\/p>\n \u201cBeaty and a Beat<\/strong>\u201c has now hit No. 1 on Billboard<\/em>\u2018s Billboard Global 200 and Billboard Global Excl. U.S. charts. How does it feel to see a song that\u2019s nearly 15 years old enjoy this kind of resurgence?<\/strong><\/p>\n There\u2019s been a lot of negatives, I think, in the streaming era. But the positive is that because everything\u2019s on the same technology, [listeners] just want to hear great stuff. Like, for my kids, it feels like every boy goes through an Eminem phase because it\u2019s just objectively good. I remember one day my youngest came home from school, two or three years ago, and he goes, \u201cPapa, have you heard this new song called \u2018Mama Said Knock You Out\u2019 [by LL Cool J]. It\u2019s so good.\u201d<\/p>\n They just want s\u2013t that\u2019s great. They don\u2019t reference this as old. When it\u2019s on a TV show and they hear a song that\u2019s great, they stream it. And if it\u2019s really<\/em> great, it\u2019s ear candy \u2014 they just listen again and again and again and again, and it\u2019s new to them. So that\u2019s really fun.<\/p>\n What is another song that you\u2019ve written that you would like to see make a comeback this year?<\/strong><\/p>\n Whenever anyone asks me my favorite songs that I\u2019ve been lucky to be a part of, it\u2019s usually the ones that haven\u2019t really worked. But \u201cOne Last Time\u201d by Ariana Grande is really important to me. And \u201cWhat Makes You Beautiful\u201d [by One Direction] obviously, because it\u2019s about my wife, is really important to me. So I wouldn\u2019t mind them having a resurgence.<\/p>\n Anytime people are listening to songs I\u2019ve being able to be a part of with my very talented friends, I feel very lucky that I got to do it and that the songs have connected. It\u2019s nice to know that the thing you dedicated your life to means something to people.<\/p>\n Best of Billboard<\/strong><\/p>\n Sign up for Billboard’s Newsletter<\/a>. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook<\/a>, Twitter<\/a>, and Instagram<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n \u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.yahoo.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" \u201cI didn\u2019t even meet him during \u2018Beauty and a Beat,\u201d recalls hit songwriter-producer Savan Kotecha, who co-wrote the Justin Bieber pop hit alongside Max Martin, Zedd and Nicki Minaj. \u201cI was in Sweden when [Justin] was in L.A. recording it. But he\u2019s super sweet \u2014 obviously a gifted, generational talent.\u201d Over the course of his […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2404939,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25172],"tags":[469948,309908,22082,343101,335498,392828],"class_list":["post-2404938","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-entertainment","tag-beauty-and-a-beat","tag-coachella","tag-justin-bieber","tag-max-martin","tag-nicki-minaj","tag-savan-kotecha"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/Savan-Kotecha-on-Co-Writing-Justin-Biebers-\u2018Beauty-and-a-Beat.jpeg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2404938","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2404938"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2404938\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2404940,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2404938\/revisions\/2404940"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2404939"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2404938"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2404938"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2404938"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}