Rich was born in Detroit, Michigan, United States,[1] and first attracted attention through the production team of Tim & Bob.

[2] Under the moniker "The Tony Rich Project," he released his debut album Words in early 1996.

He made his feature film debut, portraying Duke Ellington in the 1997 crime drama Hoodlum.

[6] That same year, he was commissioned to produce a few remixes for the Spice Girls hit single "Viva Forever" in addition to doing some appearances/production work on albums by CeCe Winans and Eric Clapton.

[6] In 1999, he recorded a remake of the classic song "If This World Were Mine" with Grenique for the Marvin is 60 compilation tribute album.

[7] For the next few years, he would write and compose songs for a couple of gospel artists such as Anointed and The Wordd.

In 2006, Rich released his fourth album, Pictures which featured the theme of snapshots of a relationship.

It garnered a positive response from his fans, who marked the return to a R&B-focused genre than his previous release.

[11] In 2009, he began preparations to release a new studio album titled Speak Me with Hidden Beach Recordings.