About David Foster
David Walter Foster OC OBC is a Canadian record producer, film composer, and music executive. He has won 16 Grammy Awards from 47 nominations. Foster's career began as a keyboardist for the pop group Skylark in the early 1970s before focusing largely on composing and production. Often in tandem with songwriter Diane Warren, Foster has contributed to material for prominent music industry artists in various genres since then, and is credited with production on over 40 pop hits on the Billboard Hot 100. He has also chaired Verve Records from 2012 to 2016.
Foster was born in Victoria, British Columbia, the son of Maurice "Maury" Foster, an office worker, and Eleanor May Foster , a homemaker. In 1963, at the age of 13, he enrolled in the University of Washington music program. In 1965, he auditioned to lead the band in an Edmonton nightclub owned by jazz musician Tommy Banks. Banks mentored Foster in jazz, producing records, and the music business. After one year there, he moved to Toronto to play with Ronnie Hawkins. In 1966, he joined a backup band for Chuck Berry. In 1974, he moved to Los Angeles with his band Skylark.
Foster was a keyboardist for the pop group Skylark, discovered by Eirik Wangberg. The song "Wildflower" was a top ten hit in 1973. When the group disbanded, Foster remained in Los Angeles and, together with Jay Graydon, he formed the band Airplay. In 1975, Foster played on George Harrison's album Extra Texture. He followed that up a year later by playing the Fender Rhodes and clavinet on Harrison's album Thirty Three & 1/3. In 1976, Foster joined Guthrie Thomas on Thomas' second Capitol Records album, Lies and Alibis, with Ringo Starr and a host of other performers. Foster was a major contributor to the 1979 Earth, Wind & Fire album I Am, as a studio player and arranger. He was a co-writer on six of the album's tracks, such as "After the Love Has Gone", for which he and his co-writers, Graydon and Bill Champlin, won the 1980 Grammy Award for Best R&B Song.
Foster worked as a producer on albums for The Tubes: 1981's The Completion Backward Principle and 1983's Outside Inside. Foster co-wrote such songs as "Talk to Ya Later", with Tubes singer Fee Waybill and Steve Lukather from Toto; the Top 40 hit "Don't Want to Wait Anymore"; and the number 10 US hit "She's a Beauty". On the 1980 Boz Scaggs album Middle Man, he co-wrote and he played keyboard on some of Scaggs's most successful songs, including "Breakdown Dead Ahead", "Jojo", and "Simone", followed by "Look What You've Done to Me" from the film Urban Cowboy.
Foster was a major contributor to the career of jazz rock band Chicago in the early and middle 1980s, having worked as the band's producer on Chicago 16 , Chicago 17 — their biggest selling, multi-platinum album — and Chicago 18 . As was typical of his producing projects from this period, Foster was a co-writer on "Hard to Say I'm Sorry" , "Love Me Tomorrow" , "Stay the Night" , and "You're the Inspiration" . These were co-written with the band's bassist Peter Cetera. In 1986, Foster also helped Cetera co-write his US No. 1 solo hit "Glory of Love".
Foster co-wrote Kenny Loggins's songs "Heart to Heart" , from the 1982 album High Adventure, and "Forever" , from the 1985 album Vox Humana.
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