Winner of 5 JUNO Awards, 22 nominations
Also a top-notch musician and composer, he has been awarded five Juno Awards, 14 Grammy Awards(including three Producer of the Year awards), produced songs that have driven several No. 1 albums, including Celine Dion’s Grammy-winning Falling Into You, Natalie Cole’s Unforgettable, Whitney Houston’s The Bodyguard, Barbra Streisand’s Broadway and Back to Broadway, Michael Bolton’s Timeless: The Classics and Kenny G’s Breathless.
Between 1994 and 1997, he had four of his productions stay at No. 1 on the Billboard hot 100 chart for 42 weeks-Toni Braxton’s “Unbreak My Heart”, Whitney Houston’s “I Will Always Love you,” All-4-One’s “I Swear” and Celine Dion’s ” Because You Loved Me.”In 1994, he joined Atlantic Records as vice president, in 1995 he established his own Atlantic-distribution label, 143 records (acts include The Corrs, Kevin Sharp, Mollies Revenge and Niles Rivers), and in 1997 he was appointed senior vice president of Warner Music Group.Recent credits include co-writing and producing “Tell Him,” the lead single from Celine Dion’s latest chart buster, Let’s Talk About Love, as well as producing four other songs on the album.
Born in Victoria, B.C. in 1949 Foster began playing the piano at the age of five and worked as a teen in England with a Victoria rock band, the Strangers, as well as in Toronto with Ronnie Hawkins. Joining Vancouver band Skylark, he went to Los Angeles in 1972. The group disband and Foster stayed in L.A., working as a studio musician for Michael Jackson, George Harrison, Rod Stewart, Barbra Streisand and others.His career as a record producer began in 1976. A prot%E9g%E9 of Quincy Jones, he was known for his hands-on approach in the studio- writing/rewriting and arranging material. In 1985, he composed (with Bryan Adams), arranged and produced the Canadian contribution to African famine relief, Tears Are Not Enough.
He has released five of his own albums, penned the theme of the Winter Olympics in Calgary in 1988, and produced soundtracks for a number of films, most notably St. Elmo’s Fire for which he wrote the score and co-wrote the No. 1 single “Man in Motion.”A dedicated humanitarian, Foster established the David Foster Foundation in 1986 to assist families of children in need of organ transplants. He hosts an annual celebrity softball game in Victoria to help raise funds for the foundation and in 1988 he received the Order of Canada in recognition of his efforts. He has long been active in the philanthropic community, lending his musical/producer skills to organizations such as the Andre Agassi Foundation, Race to Erase MS, Malibu High School Scholarship Program, Cedar’s Sinai Research For Women’s Cancer and many more.
He live in L.A. with his wife and frequent musical collaborator and co-writer, Linda Thompson, and they have six children between them.
How does he explain his phenomenal success as a songwriter and producer? “I gravitate toward tugging at heartstrings,” he says, “and I treat everyday in the studio as life-of-death.”
User Comments