Though he's best known as the behind-the-scenes producer and songwriter for megastars like Celine Dion, Michael Buble and Josh Groban, David Foster isn't afraid to step out in front of the mic on occasion. In 2018, he launched The Hitman Tour, a special series of intimate shows that saw him perform selections from his vast repertoire of hits on the piano alongside a revolving cast of guest vocalists (including his wife, Katharine McPhee) and share stories of the songs' creation. The tour proved so successful that Foster extended it through 2019 and into 2020. But Foster isn't one to rest on his past glories: April 2020 sees the release of his first solo album in 24 years, Eleven Words, which applies the stripped-down piano setting of the Hitman Tour to a set of 11 new originals.

David Foster in Concert

Look up any adult-contemporary pop hit from the past 40 years, and there's a good chance David Foster's name is somewhere in the credits. Over the course of his storied career, the Victoria, British Columbia, impresario has mentored some of the biggest names in pop and pushed veteran rock artists to even loftier levels of success, earning some 16 Grammys and Order of Canada honors in the process. After first breaking into the music industry playing keyboards for Canadian soul-rock troupe Skylark, Foster spent the '70s as a session player for the likes of George Harrison and Diana Ross, before scoring his first high-profile writing credit on Earth, Wind & Fire's classic 1979 slow jam "After the Love Has Gone." But through his early-'80s collaborations with Chicago, Foster minted his signature glossy sound, transforming the group from a jazzy classic-rock warhorse into a soft-rock hit machine before applying that Midas touch to Lite-FM divas like Celine Dion and Whitney Houston in the '90s. Amazingly, Foster's hitmaking prowess has only grown more potent since then — in the 21st century, he turned Michael Buble from a wedding singer into a world-class crooner and guided Josh Groban's crossover from classical to pop. But for all his successes behind the boards, Foster has never lost his passion for performing, by periodically tending to his own career as a solo artist in between his production work.