WILLIAMS, JOSEPH
Joseph Williams was born on september 1st 1960 in Santa Monica, California
and grew up in Encino Valley. He is the son of the late singer/actress
Barbara Ruick and famous Hollywood composer John Williams, who's wellknown
for his work with Steven Spielberg (Jaws, E.T., Indiana Jones, etc.)
He has an older brother, Mark (who introduced Joseph to some of the
individual Toto members when he was 15), and an older sister. Growing up in
a world of music and arts, Joseph knew as a child he wanted to become a
famous singer !
When Joseph was 18 years old, Barry Bregman took him under his wings to
develop his talent for singing and composing. One of the first things he
learned was that the music business required a lot of patience and
willpower. His older brother Mark gave him his first start in a real
band, called Joair. This band was completely patterned after Toto with
Mike Landau playing guitars.
In 1982 he released his first, self-titled solo-album, featuring Steve
Lukather on MCA records. The single, "DJ in my life" went platinum in Japan.
After this, Joseph left for Las Vegas where he joined the musical
"Dreamstreet". He impersonated famous entertainers like Ray Charles, Sonny
Bono, Elvis Presley and even Fred Astaire !. During this time he also did
some work for McDonalds in their commercials.
When he returned to Los Angeles, Joseph joined Jeffrey Osbourne on tour for
three years as a backing-vocalist. In the meantime he worked for a music
publishing company and wrote a song for the Miami Vice soundtrack, among
others. His affiliation with soundtracks continued when he wrote and sang
the song "Save the night" for the hit movie "the Goonies". In coorperation
with his father, he also did soundtracks for other movies; "Jaws 2", "Return
of the Jedi" and "The fury".
Returning from the Jeffrey Osbourne tour, Joseph heard Toto was looking for
a new lead singer. He applied for the job and ten days after his audition he
was the new Toto vocalist !
With Toto he released "Fahrenheit" (1986) and "The Seventh one" (1988), the
last album giving him the chance to work with one of Joseph' own favorites:
Jon Anderson. After the 1988 tour he left Toto, which had something to do
with his voice not being able to perform live night after night.