Born in Lowell Massachusetts, James took up the clarinet at the age of eight, switching to sax when he was ten. James spent his early teen years in
New Rochelle, New York. He became musically influenced by the R&B
Motown genre and saxophonist
Grover Washington, Jr. When he was fourteen his family moved to
Los Angeles, where he joined a fusion band that opened for acts like
Flora Purim and the
Yellowjackets. Another member of this early band was
John Shanks, now a successful pop producer and guitarist with Bon Jovi. James eventually received a degree in history from
UCLA, but began playing music full-time after graduation. James learned to play keyboards and in 1985 he joined
Morris Day's band. His R&B influence was further strengthened by seven years of touring and sessions as a sideman with Day,
The Isley Brothers,
Bobby Caldwell,
Randy Crawford,
Teena Marie and others. It was on the road with Crawford in 1986 that he earned his now-famous moniker, when his physique led a bandmate to joke "We'll have to start calling you 'Boney' James!" In the early 1990s, while on tour with
Bobby Caldwell's band, he met engineer and producer Paul Brown, beginning a 10-year period of collaboration. In 1992 he released his debut album as a leader,
Trust, on the
independent record label Spindletop Records. Following the record's success, he was signed by the Warner Brothers label in 1994, on which he released the RIAA Certified Gold Records
Seduction,
Sweet Thing and
Body Language albums. In 2000 he collaborated with trumpeter
Rick Braun on an album called
Shake it Up. Their duets include the now classic updated version of Hugh Masakela's "
Grazin' in the Grass". Other artists who have made guest appearances on Boney's records include
October London,
Lalah Hathaway,
Raheem DeVaughn,
Faith Evans,
George Benson,
George Duke,
Dwele,
Al Jarreau,
Philip Bailey,
Anthony Hamilton,
Jaheim,
Eric Benét,
Dave Hollister,
Stokley Williams,
Avery*Sunshine,
Kenny Lattimore and
Angie Stone. James began co-producing his records with Brown in 1997, and assumed the role of sole producer starting with his Grammy-nominated
Pure album in 2003. Following a string of chart-topping albums, in 2006 James moved to
Concord Records In 2014, he produced two songs on Al Jarreau's George Duke tribute album
My Old Friend, "No Rhyme No Reason" (feat.
Kelly Price) and "Bring Me Joy" (feat. George Duke). In 2015, he released
futuresoul which spent eleven weeks at No. 1 on the Billboard Contemporary Jazz Chart and was the best selling Contemporary Jazz Record of 2015. In August 2015, James made his first appearance on
The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon. 2017 saw the release of
Honestly, his sixteenth album, which became his eleventh No. 1 on the Billboard Jazz Albums Chart. It also reached No. 22 on the Billboard Current Albums Chart, his highest pop chart debut to date. June 2020 he released his seventeenth studio album
Solid, describing it as "a reaction to how stressful the world feels these days. Music is a respite, it’s always ‘solid’ and never lets me down." The CD broke his previous Pop Chart record, debuting at #10 on the Billboard Top Albums Chart. His eighteenth album
Detour was released on September 23, 2022. == Personal life ==