Burt Bacharach

Burt Freeman Bacharach (May 12, 1928 – February 8, 2023) built a reputation as a towering force in 20th-century popular music, working as a composer, songwriter, record producer, and pianist. He was a key name in orchestral pop and easy listening, turning out hundreds of songs—most famously with lyricist Hal David—and he often handled the arranging, conducting, and producing of his own recordings. His compositions stood out for their unusual chord progressions and shifting time signatures, a reflection of his jazz background, and he frequently chose uncommon instruments for small orchestras.

Bacharach and David teamed up in 1956, scoring their first major hits with Marty Robbins' "The Story of My Life" (1957) and Perry Como's "Magic Moments" (1958). From 1961 to 1972, they wrote most of their material for Dionne Warwick. Starting with Jerry Butler's "Make It Easy on Yourself" (1962), Bacharach took full control over the recording of his songs, and after that success, he co-wrote hits for singers like Gene Pitney, Cilla Black, Dusty Springfield, Tom Jones, and B. J. Thomas. He moved into film and theater, contributing songs and scores to *What's New Pussycat?* (1965), *Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid* (1968), and the Broadway musical *Promises, Promises* (1968). When *Lost Horizon* (1973) flopped commercially, his partnership with David dissolved, and his work with Warwick was interrupted by lawsuits. He later regained prominence by collaborating with Carole Bayer Sager and Elvis Costello.

More than a thousand musicians have recorded Bacharach's songs, and those recordings have appeared in the soundtracks of many major films. He won six Grammy Awards, three Academy Awards, and one Emmy Award, and his work helped shape later styles like sunshine pop, soft rock, chamber pop, and Shibuya-kei. Between 1957 and 1987, he placed fifty-two songs on the U.S. Top 40, including six number-one hits: "This Guy's in Love with You" (Herb Alpert, 1968), "Raindrops Keep Fallin' on My Head" (Thomas, 1969), "(They Long to Be) Close to You" (the Carpenters, 1970), "Arthur's Theme (Best That You Can Do)" (Christopher Cross, 1981), "That's What Friends Are For" (Warwick, 1986), and "On My Own" (Bayer Sager, 1986). In 2012, Bacharach and David became the first songwriting team to receive the Library of Congress Gershwin Prize for Popular Song. *Rolling Stone* ranked them number 32 on its 2015 list of the "100 Greatest Songwriters of All Time."

**Early life and education**

Bacharach was born in Kansas City, Missouri, and grew up in Forest Hills, Queens, New York City, graduating from Forest Hills High School in 1946. His father, Mark Bertram "Bert" Bacharach, was a well-known syndicated newspaper columnist; his mother, Irma M. (née Freeman), was an amateur painter and songwriter who encouraged him to practice piano, drums, and cello as a child. The family was Jewish, but Bacharach said they didn't practice or pay much attention to Judaism. "But the kids I knew were Catholic," he added. "I was Jewish, but I didn't want anybody to know about it."

As a teenager, Bacharach had a strong interest in jazz and disliked his classical piano lessons. He often used a fake ID to get into 52nd Street nightclubs, where he heard bebop musicians like Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker, whose style later influenced his songwriting. He studied music (Associate of Music, 1948) at McGill University in Montreal under Helmut Blume, at the Mannes School of Music in New York City, and at the Music Academy of the West in Montecito, California. During this time, he explored a range of music, including jazz, whose sophisticated harmony became a hallmark of his compositions. His composition teachers included Darius Milhaud, Henry Cowell, and Bohuslav Martinů. Bacharach cited Milhaud, under whom he wrote a "Sonatina for Violin, Oboe and Piano," as his greatest influence.

**Career**

**1950s**

Bacharach was drafted into the U.S. Army in the late 1940s and served for two years. He was stationed in Germany, where he played piano in officers' clubs, as well as at Fort Dix and Governors Island. During his service, he arranged and played music for dance bands. While both were in the army in Germany, he met the popular singer Vic Damone. After his discharge, Bacharach spent three years as Damone's pianist and conductor. Damone later recalled, "Burt was clearly bound to go out on his own. He was an exceptionally talented, classically trained pianist, with very clear ideas on the musicality of songs, how they should be played, and what they should sound like. I appreciated his musical gifts." He then worked in similar roles for other singers, including Polly Bergen, Steve Lawrence, the Ames Brothers, and Paula Stewart (who became his first wife). When better jobs were scarce, he worked at resorts in the Catskill Mountains, accompanying singers like Joel Grey.

In 1956, at age 28, Bacharach's output picked up when composer Peter Matz recommended him to Marlene Dietrich, who needed an arranger and conductor for her nightclub shows. He became a part-time music director for Dietrich, the actress and singer who had been an international screen star during Hollywood's golden age. They toured worldwide on and off until the early 1960s, and when not touring, he wrote songs. This collaboration gave him his first major recognition as a conductor and arranger. In her autobiography, Dietrich wrote that Bacharach especially loved touring in Russia and Poland because he thought highly of the violinists there and appreciated the public's reaction. According to her, he also liked Edinburgh, Paris, and the Scandinavian countries, and "he also felt at home" in those places.