For a period of time in the late 1980s, it was nearly impossible to turn on pop radio without hearing a song by Richard Marx.
One of the most commercially successful singer-songwriters of his generation, Marx's music helped define the sound of late-'80s pop and rock ballads. Songs like “Right Here Waiting” and, later, “Now and Forever” became so ubiquitous that they could almost be taken for granted. Classics hiding in plain sight, but often coming out after dark: “Hold On to the Nights,” “Endless Summer Nights.”
Marx came of age at the peak of the MTV generation. Today, he's even married to a former MTV VJ, Daisy Fuentes. A blue-eyed soul singer, he had a sharp, poignant songwriting sensibility and a seemingly effortless gift for catchy melodies. And although he was barely more than a kid when he started, there was something unquestionably adult about his writing.
But Richard's songwriting ambitions began long before he became a pop star. Growing up in Chicago, the son of jazz pianist and composer Dick Marx and singer Ruth Marx, he was already singing professionally on his father's commercial jingle sessions as a young child.
Nearly 40 years after his breakthrough, Richard Marx remains a fixture in popular music. Even before his debut album arrived in 1987, he'd been encouraged by Lionel Richie to move to Los Angeles and was writing songs for artists including Kenny Rogers.
Over the years, his songs have been recorded by *NSYNC, Josh Groban and Luther Vandross, with whom he co-wrote the Grammy-winning “Dance With My Father.”
When the pop landscape changed in the late 1990s, Marx found a new chapter as a songwriter and producer for other artists, building a studio near his home outside Chicago, where he could keep making music while raising his three sons.
His latest album, After Hours, brings him back to the musical world of his parents. It's a collection of standards, including “Fly Me to the Moon” and “The Way You Look Tonight,” alongside original songs written in the Great American Songbook style.
He describes writing the original songs as one of the most satisfying songwriting experiences of his career. And at 63, he says he finally feels ready to sing the standards he grew up hearing.
We spoke recently about his father's remarkable musical life, the experience of growing up in recording studios, and the moment when Lionel Richie took a teenage Richard Marx under his wing. We talked about the extraordinary success of his early records, his decision to move away from the pop-star treadmill, and the changing nature of a career in music.
We also talked about his three sons, all of them musicians, and the challenges they face trying to build careers in a business that bears little resemblance to the one their father entered 45 years ago.
