Eric Benét
Eric Benét, the R&B singer behind Spend My Life With You, on his Milwaukee roots, Warner Bros. years, marriages, acting roles and his 2025 album The Co-Star.
Photo: MostMillions, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons. Resized and converted to WebP.
A House Full of Singers in Milwaukee
Eric Benét Jordan was born on October 15, 1966, the youngest of five children. His parents had moved north from Mobile, Alabama, to Milwaukee, and that is where he grew up. Sources split on where he was born: The Ford and Authentic Wisconsin give Milwaukee, while SoulTracks describes him as born in Mobile and raised in Milwaukee. Rolling Stone's 2025 profile puts him at 58 that April, which matches the 1966 birth year rather than the 1970 date some older profiles use.
The family went to a Methodist church, and music was ordinary at home. "I come from a family where everybody sings and everybody has this musical acumen," he told Rolling Stone. An older brother, Steve, did comic voice skits, a habit Benét would pick up decades later on social media.
He attended Milwaukee Trade and Technical High School, known locally as Bradley Tech. He enrolled in college but dropped out to work on music full time.
Benét, the 1992 EMI Album
His first record deal was not as a solo act. With his sister Lisa and his cousin George Nash Jr., he formed a group called Benét, which released one album on EMI in 1992. It went largely unnoticed. Benét took a job at UPS and worked as an assistant recording engineer while he kept writing.
A Gale profile reprinted on Encyclopedia.com adds that the mid-1990s were a hard stretch at home: his father died of cancer, and the mother of his daughter India died in a car accident. Rolling Stone dates her death to 1993; the Gale profile places it in 1995.
The Demo That Reached Alison Ball
A demo tape found its way to Alison Ball at Warner Bros., who signed him as a solo artist. The Ford dates the signing to 1994. His debut, True to Myself, came out on Warner Bros. in 1996 and produced the singles "Spiritual Thang," "Femininity" and a cover of "Let's Stay Together."
Ball matters to the rest of this story. Three decades later she is his business partner: the two co-founded JBR Creative Group, the label that released his 2025 album.
A Day in the Life and Spend My Life With You
His second album, A Day in the Life, arrived in 1999. Its single "Spend My Life With You," a duet with Tamia, reached number one, earned a Grammy nomination, and won the 2000 NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Song, according to his official biography. The same album carried "Georgy Porgy" with Faith Evans, which spent 14 weeks on the Billboard Hot 100.
Halle Berry, Manuela Testolini and Three Daughters
Benét married the actress Halle Berry in January 2001. They separated in 2003, and the divorce was finalized in January 2005, Atlanta Black Star reported. Berry adopted India during the marriage. In a 2021 interview about that period, Benét said, "There's always three truths."
In the summer of 2011 he married Manuela Testolini, the former wife of Prince, in Newport Beach, California, ABC7 reported. They have two daughters, both minors. With India, Benét has three daughters in all.
Glitter, Half & Half and Kaya
Acting has run alongside the records. Benét guest-starred on the sitcom For Your Love, appeared in the 2001 film Glitter, played Reece Wilcox on Half & Half in 2005, and had a recurring part on MTV's Kaya in 2007. Trinity Goodheart, a film he appeared in, screened at the American Black Film Festival in 2011, and he later turned up on Real Husbands of Hollywood.
Hurricane With David Foster
Hurricane, released in 2005, was made with the producer David Foster and included the single "I Wanna Be Loved." It came out the year his divorce was finalized. Albums followed at a slower pace: Love & Life in 2008, Lost in Time in 2010, The One in 2012, and a self-titled record in 2016.
Love & Life brought another round of Grammy nominations, including one for "You're the Only One," and "Sometimes I Cry" was nominated in 2012 for Best Traditional R&B Performance, his official site says.
Primary Wave's Urban AC Division
When the music publisher Primary Wave launched an urban adult contemporary division, it named him head of it, working with the producer Demonte Posey, The Hollywood Reporter reported. At the time he counted 20 years as a recording artist. Primary Wave had been bought by BMG Rights Management in September 2013 for $150 million.
JBR Creative Group and The Co-Star
In the summer of 2024 he released a Duets EP. One track, "So Distracted" with Chanté Moore, reached the top 10 of Billboard's Adult R&B Airplay chart. A year later came The Co-Star, his first full album in nearly a decade, released through JBR Creative Group. Every guest on it is a woman, 14 in all.
He promoted it partly through comic skits on TikTok. "I'm still connecting with people by being myself," he told Rolling Stone, and, of the new record, "I'm more authentic now than I've ever been." In the spring of 2025 he toured as an opener on the R&B Invitation Tour with Musiq Soulchild and Joe, and he headlined the Kings Theatre in Brooklyn.
No reputable outlet has published a net worth estimate for Benét, and no catalog sale or ownership stake has been reported that would allow one to be calculated, so this article does not give a figure. What is on record is ownership of a different kind: after starting on EMI and Warner Bros., he now puts out his music on a label he co-founded. He turns 60 on October 15, 2026.
Sources
- Eric Benet Interview: New Album 'The Co-Star,' TikTok Skits
- About | Eric Benét
- Eric Benet - SoulTracks
- Eric Benet | Encyclopedia.com
- Eric Benét | The Ford
- Wisconsin Facts | Famous Wisconsinites | Eric Benét
- Singer Eric Benet marries Prince's ex-wife Manuela Testolini | ABC7 Chicago | abc7chicago.com - ABC7 Chicago
- 'There's Always Three Truths': Eric Benét Opens Up About His Relationship with Halle Berry
- Primary Wave Launches New Urban AC Division with Eric Benét as Chief
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