Robert Louis Buchanan, known as Robbie Buchanan, was born in 1957 in Vancouver, Canada. He began playing the piano at age six and had his first concert as a pianist at twelve, performing six nights a week in Dawson City, Yukón. As a teenager, Buchanan joined Soul Unlimited before moving to Los Angeles in the late 1970s to write music with Carl Graves. His breakthrough came when he played a pianist in the 1978 film The Rose. Throughout his career, Buchanan collaborated extensively as a session musician and contributed significantly to film soundtracks, including arrangements for "Beauty and the Beast" from Beauty and the Beast and "A Whole New World" from Aladdin. He was also credited as a collaborator for various musicians' works. These works included Whitney Houston's 1987 album Didn't We Almost Have It All, Anita Baker's 1988 album Giving You The Best That I Got, and Glenn Frey's 1988 album True Love. Buchanan released a single named "The Chosen One" in 1986. His demos were also compiled into an album titled Original Demos in 2000.