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Platinum Patnuz Productions
Turhan "Bigg Boyy T" Vandyke and Jay Stixx are Platinum Patnuz, two mainstream American musicians from Detroit, Michigan. Jay, the more soft-spoken of the two has been drumming since the age of three and comes from a family of musicians. Turhan "Bigg Boyy T" or "T" as he is known to friends, is the son of the late great pianist Earl F. Vandyke, the first band leader of the legendary Funk Brothers of Motown Records, and the nephew of Abdule "DUKE" Fakir of The Four Tops. He is an accomplished pianist.
Born and raised in different parts of Detroit, both were surrounded by an eclectic music environment, which led to each joining music groups in their early teens. While they had heard of each other, it was not until the late 1980fs that they finally met. New Anxiety, a local Detroit R & B group of that time was looking for new members, so the two became part of the group. Their keen understanding of the Detroit music scene and their ability to add their own unique brand of funk to the music they played made the group highly popular in Michigan, Ohio, and Canada.
Looking for an opportuity to branch out into other areas of the music industry and hoping to take advantage of the exploding music scene in Japan, the two decided to quit New Anxiety, and took a chance and moved to Japan in the mid-1990fs. They spent several years alternating between Nagoya, Japan and Detroit, Michigan where they expanded their knowledge of the music scene and increased their programming abilities. Their work in Nagoya revolved around performing in highly popluar clubs and in 1999, they relocated to Tokyo, having built up a good reputation. They began working the club scene in Tokyo and in 2000 they hired a manager to help them break into other aspects of the music industry. Since that time, they have pursued music careers both together as Platinum Partnuz and individually.
They have performed with many artists over the past few years including such names as Jade Kwan, The Three Degrees, Wanya Morris of Boys II Men, Tony Rich, Ollie "Ali" Woodson of The Temptations, Nobu and Fuki, and Michael Paulo. They have toured repeatedly with Ashanti, BoA, Chu Kosaka, Chemistry, and Asiah. They are scheduled to perform with Ashanti once again on her upcoming Asian & Pacific tour. They have appeared on Japanese television with Eikichi Yazawa and Chemistry and hosted a music television show called MUSIC BEFORE BREAK.
Their first venture into the programming and production area was with Japanese artist Querer in 2000. They composed a song, recorded all the tracks, and produced it with Querer singing vocals. It was released on the Victor-JVC label with the title "He was She". They wrote and produced more than twenty songs for The Swedish popstar Gigi Hamilton for a CD which has yet to be released.
They have composed for Asiah, Chu Kosaka, Lil' Ai, Hanah, GTS, Riyu Kosaka, Aki Asahina, The Contours, Ke-Ke, and Melodie Sextion. Asiah's "My Body" reached the number 1 spot of InterFM's Top 8 at 8 program and stayed there for two weeks. They have written several songs for Lil' Ai including "Your Love Is" which was released in 2003. Songs written for Hanah include "Alone" released in 2003 and "Crazy Game", yet to be released. GTS released "No One Else Can Do" featuring the fabulous vocals stylings of Ms Melody Sexton on the Avex label. "We Love Gospel", the CD released by Chu Kosaka, contains more than ten songs written, arranged, composed and produced by Platinum Patnuz. For Misia, whom many Japanese consider the queen of R & B, the guys arranged four of the songs on the tribute CD, "Misia Everything," released in 2004 under the Universal label. The artists who recorded these songs included KC -n- Jojo, Eryka Badu, Hanah, David King, Melodie Sexton among others. Chu Kosaka's CD titled "People" includes five songs they arranged: "I Love People", "Knocking On Your Heart", "I Believe in You", "Birthday" and "People Get Ready". This CD was produced by Haruomi Hosono of YMO and released by Epic-Sony.
They are currently working with artist K. D. Brosia on his first CD, scheduled to be released sometime in June of this year. Jay Stixx and "Bigg Boyy T" are Platinum Patnuz Productions. They have their fingers on the pulse of the music scene, which is why their reputation in Japan is growing.
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