at
Sterling Sound, NYC, 1991 Boyer was born in
Lebanon, Pennsylvania, and graduated from
Cedar Crest High School and went on to earn a Bachelor of Electrical Engineering degree from the
University of Delaware in 1973. During his high school and college years, he played keyboards in a number of east coast regional bands including Rain, which he was with from 1970 to 1975. Boyer attended and graduated from
the Institute of Audio Research to prepare him for work in the business. His first job in the industry was at
Phil Ramone's
A&R Recording Studios where he was hired by Don Frey as an assistant engineer. Initially, he assisted on commercial jingles with engineers
Elliot Scheiner and Don Hahn. Soon after, Boyer became Phil Ramone's assistant engineer. His first credit with Ramone was on the film
A Star is Born with
Barbra Streisand and
Kris Kristofferson. Over the years, Boyer engineered many of Billy Joel's records including
The Stranger,
52nd Street,
The Nylon Curtain and
An Innocent Man as well as produced Joel's documentary,
The Matter of Trust: A Bridge to Russia and
Kohuept [live],
Rupert Holmes'
Partners in Crime featuring "
Escape (The Piña Colada Song)" and "
Him"/"Get Outta Yourself", and
Peter Cetera's
Peter Cetera. In 1987, Boyer, along with David Dering, founded AmericanHelix, a primary CD manufacturer for the independent record label industry. After it was sold, Boyer worked in
Silicon Valley as a software services sales executive, and 2015 found him returning to
Pro Tools studio mixing, live concert technical management and
FOH mixing for a number of Bay area communities during their summer concert seasons. Boyer died in the San Francisco Bay area of California on June 15, 2022. == Selected works ==