Composer Burt Bacharach, perhaps best known for his Oscar-winning song Raindrops Keep Fallin’ On My Head, has died at the age of 94.
Hailed as one of the 20th century’s greatest songwriters, he wrote more than 500 songs, which were performed by more than 1,200 different artists, during his seven-decade career.
Despite numerous collaborations, it was the songs he wrote in the 1960s and 1970s with lyricist Hal David and performed by singer Dionne Warwick that garnered the greatest recognition, establishing all three as musical stars in their own right.
Photo: Dezo Hoffman/Shutterstock
His music – which has often been described as “easy listening” or “elevator music” due to its catchy melodies – was inspired by an early love of jazz.
But fans of his work would argue that while instantly memorable and compelling, the blended metres, complex melodies, unusual chord progression and asymmetrical rhythms mean his work was anything but ‘easy’.
Skilled pianist as well as composer, Bacharach he arranged, conducted and produced most of his songs.
A six times Grammy award winner and three times Academy Award winner, his compositional prowess has earned him comparisons with American music greats including George Gershwin, Cole Porter and Richard Rodgers.
Early collaborations included Perry Como and Jerry Butler, continuing to work with stars such as Frank Sinatra, Cilla Black, Dusty Springfield, Tom Jones and the Carpenters.
Some of her biggest hits include Academy Award-winning Raindrops Keep Fallin’ on My Head, (They long to be) near you, Anyone with a heart, Always something there to remind me, and What the world needs now is love.
Hollywood has also played its part in boosting his career, with several of his songs becoming soundtracks to major motion pictures.
photo: AP
The Look of Love, which was used in the 1967 spy parody of a James Bond film, Casino Royale, went gold for Dusty Springfield and Brazilian musician Sergio Mendes, and was also inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame.
Many years later, the parody film would lead to cameo roles for Bacharach in all three Austin Powers films, with Mike Myers calling him a “lucky charm” for the films.
What’s New Pussycat? – who appears in the 1965 Woody Allen film of the same name – gave the Welsh singer Tom Jones his second US top 40 hit and was also nominated for an Academy Award for Best Original Song the following year. It went on to be sung by stars including Barbra Streisand, The Four Seasons and The Wailers.
His mention in Monty Python’s The Meaning Of Life was proof of his rightful place in pop culture, as well as his reputation as a womanizer.
“I didn’t want to disappoint my mother”
Born Burt Freeman Bacharach on May 12, 1928, in Kansas City, Missouri, his father was a newspaper columnist and his mother a painter and amateur pianist.
The family moved to New York when she was three. A Jewish family in a largely Catholic neighborhood, Bacharach said in his 2013 autobiography, Whoever Had a Heart: My Life and My Music, that he kept his faith to himself and “didn’t want anyone to know.”
It was because of his mother’s love of music that Bacharach took piano lessons as a child. He hated them with a passion, but later told fans at concerts that he persevered, “I didn’t want to disappoint my mother.”
He went on to study music at McGill University in Montreal, Quebec, Canada before completing his education at the Mannes School of Music, New York, and the Music Academy of the West in Montecito, California.
Not being a fan of the classical music he played in his classes, he would later sneak into jazz clubs as a teenager, with the style influencing his songwriting later in his career.
Drafted into the United States Army for two years in 1950 during the Korean War and stationed in Germany, he got his first taste of working in music serving as a pianist in officers’ clubs and arranging music for dance bands.
Burt Bacharach pictured at a media event in Sydney in June 2007
Getting along with singer and big band actor Vic Damone during his time in the Army, she continued to work with him as pianist and conductor after his discharge.
Touring with Hollywood royalty
From there he began playing with other artists, including actress Marlene Dietrich who is said to have called working with him “seventh heaven,” according to the 1989 biography Marlene.
Looking back on his time with her in his autobiography, Bacharach wrote, “We went to Russia, Israel, the Middle East. Going with Marlene was like going in with a conquering army.”
As the Hollywood star’s musical director, arranging and directing his nightclub shows, he achieved greater public prominence, however their working relationship ended in the early 1960s when Bacharach decided to devote himself full-time to songwriting.
Looking back on his early career, Bacharach said he initially thought songwriting was “so surprisingly easy, I thought I could write five or six a day.”
However, after about a year of work and “about a thousand” rejection letters, he concluded, “It’s hard to be straightforward.”
Arguably, her most enduring and fruitful professional relationship was with lyricist Hal David, whom she met in 1957. In the early and mid-1960s alone, the pair co-wrote over 100 songs.
He works with Hal David and Dionne Warwick
But it was in 1961, when they discovered Dionne Warwick working as a session singer, that their partnership really took off.
During their time creating songs for Warwick, they wrote 39 of his chart hits including Don’t Make Me Over, I’ll Never Fall In Love Again, Walk On By and Do You Know The Way To San Jose.
In 1969, Bacharach and David ventured into theater, writing the hit musical Promises, Promises, based on the 1960 film The Apartment. Their first and only Broadway show, won them a Grammy.
Less auspicious was their soundtrack for the 1973 film Lost Horizon, a huge flop that led to lawsuits between the pair and their professional breakup.
In turn, their split led to Warwick suing them for failing to honor their contract by working with her on his music. It was eventually settled out of court in 1979 for $5m (£4.1m).
In 1975, Bacharach worked briefly again with David, producing a Motown album together.
And in 1985, Warwick and Bacharach got together too, when he sang his hit What Friends Are For.
Co-written with his then-wife Carole Bayer Sager, the track featured Elton John, Stevie Wonder and Gladys Knight and won a Grammy for Song of the Year.
Warwick described her relationship with Bacharach at the time as: “Not just friends. We’re family.”
The three would work together again in 2000, on songs for the film Isn’t She Great, based on the life of Valley Of The Dolls writer Jacqueline Susann.
In the 1980s, Bacharach’s music inspired many of the songs to come out of the post-punk era, and in the 1990s his work was introduced to a whole new generation of fans thanks to a lounge-led renaissance. from bands like Divine Comedy and The Mike Flowers breaks out.
Named “Sexiest Man Alive” by People Magazine in 2000, the 2000s saw remixes and samples of his work topping the charts on numerous occasions.
Bacharach performing with the BBC Concert Orchestra in 2008
An American idol
A guest vocal coach on American Idol, an entire episode was also devoted to his accomplishments in 2006.
More modern collaborations include Sheryl Crow, Elvis Costello, Noel Gallagher and hip-hop producer Dr Dre.
In June 2015, Bacharach played the main stage at Glastonbury Festival, 15 years after he was forced to withdraw from the event with a shoulder injury.
Bacharach received the Johnny Mercer Award, the Songwriters Hall of Fame’s highest honor in 1996.
Other accolades include the George and Ira Gershwin Award for Musical Achievement from the University of California, Los Angeles, and a Lifetime Achievement Grammy, where he was proclaimed the greatest living composer of music, in 2006.
A performer as well as a composer, Bacharach has given concerts around the world throughout his career, often accompanied by major orchestras.
Not known for his political songs, he made an exception in 2018 with Live To See Another Day, dedicated to survivors of gun violence and whose proceeds went to a charity run by the families of some of those killed in Sandy Hook Elementary School of 2012 shooting.
In late 2022, a group of New York dancers celebrated Bacharach’s music in an evening of dance entitled The Look Of Love, named after one of his greatest hits.
Even his horse racing pastime – he owned and bred Thoroughbreds for over 30 years – was influenced by his love of music, naming one of his champion horses Heartlight No. One after his collaboration with Neil Diamond, inspired to the movie ET
Bacharach was married four times, first to television actress Paula Stuart between 1953 and 1958, then to actress Angie Dickinson between 1965 and 1980.
Bacharach and Dickinson had a daughter together, Nikki, who took her own life in 2007, aged 40, after battling with Asperger’s Syndrome from a young age.
His third marriage to lyricist Carole Bayer Sager lasted from 1982 to 1991 and they adopted one son, Christopher.
His fourth and last marriage was to former ski instructor Jane Hanson, 32 years his junior, with whom he has a son and daughter: Oliver and Raleigh.
Bacharach is survived by ex-wives Dickinson and Bayer Sager, his wife Jane, and sons Christopher, Oliver, and Raleigh.
