Burt Bacharach obituary: Composer worked with stars including Dionne Warwick, Dusty Springfield and Tom Jones during seven-decade career
Composer Burt Bacharach – perhaps best known for his Oscar-winning song Raindrops Keep Fallin’ On My Head – has died aged 94.
Hailed as one of the greatest songwriters of the 20th century, he wrote more than 500 songs, which were performed by more than 1,200 different artists, across 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 achieved the greatest recognition, establishing all three as musical stars in their own rights.
Pic: Dezo Hoffman/Shutterstock
His music – which was often described as ‘easy listening’ or ‘elevator music’ thanks to its catchy melodies – was inspired by an early love of jazz.
But fans of his work would argue that although instantly memorable and addictively hummable, the mixed meters, complex melodies, unusual chord progression and asymmetrical rhythms mean his work was far from ‘easy’.
An accomplished pianist as well as a composer, Bacharach arranged, conducted, and produced the majority of his own songs.
A six-time Grammy Award winner and three-time Academy Award winner, his composing skill earned him comparisons with American music greats including George Gershwin, Cole Porter and Richard Rodgers.
Early collaborations included Perry Como and Jerry Butler, going on to work with stars including Frank Sinatra, Cilla Black, Dusty Springfield, Tom Jones and the Carpenters.
Some of his biggest hits include the Oscar-winning Raindrops Keep Fallin’ on My Head, (They Long to Be) Close to You, Anyone Who Had A Heart, Always Something There To Remind Me, and What the World Needs Now Is Love.
Hollywood also played its part in amplifying his career, with many of his songs going on to become soundtracks to major films.
Pic: AP
The Look of Love, which was used in the 1967 spy parody of a James Bond film, Casino Royale, became a gold record for Dusty Springfield and Brazilian musician Sergio Mendes, and was also inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame.
Many years later, the spoof movie 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? – which featured in the 1965 Woody Allen film of the same name – gave Welsh singer Tom Jones his second top 40 US hit and was also nominated for an Oscar 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 ladies man.
‘I did not want to disappoint my mother’
Born Burt Freeman Bacharach on 12 May 1928, in Kansas City, Missouri, his father was a newspaper columnist and his mother an amateur painter and pianist.
The family moved to New York when he was three. A Jewish family in a largely Catholic neighbourhood, Bacharach said in his 2013 autobiography, Anyone Who Had A Heart: My Life And Music, that he kept his faith to himself, and “didn’t want anybody to know about it”.
It was thanks to his mother’s love of music that Bacharach undertook piano lessons as a child. He hated them with a passion, but later told fans during gigs that he persevered as “I did not want to disappoint my mother”.
He went on to study music at Montreal’s McGill University, Quebec, Canada, before completing his training at Mannes School of Music, in New York, and at the Music Academy of the West in Montecito, California.
Not a fan of the classical music he would play in his classes, he would later sneak into jazz clubs as a teenager, with the style going on to influence his songwriting later in his career.
Drafted into the US 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 at officer’s clubs and arranging music for dance bands.
Burt Bacharach pictured at a media event in Sydney in June 2007
Hitting it off with big band singer and actor Vic Damone during his time in the military, he went on to work with him as a pianist and conductor following his discharge.
Touring with Hollywood royalty
From there he began to play 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 conducting her nightclub shows, he gained greater public prominence, however their working relationship came to an end in the early 1960s, when Bacharach decided to devote himself to his own songwriting full time.
Looking back to the start of his career, Bacharach said he initially thought songwriting was “so startlingly simple, I thought I could write five or six a day”.
However, after a year or so of working, and “about a thousand” rejection letters, he concluded: “It’s hard to be simple.”
Without doubt, his most enduring and fruitful professional relationship was with lyricist Hal David, who he met in 1957. In the early and mid-sixties alone, the pair wrote over 100 songs together.
Work with Hal David and Dionne Warwick
But it was in 1961, when they discovered Dionne Warwick who was working as a session singer, that their partnership really took off.
During their time creating songs for Warwick, they wrote 39 of her 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 theatre, writing hit musical Promises, Promises, based on the 1960 film The Apartment. Their first and only Broadway show, it won them a Grammy.
Less auspicious was their soundtrack for the 1973 movie Lost Horizon, a massive flop which led to lawsuits between the pair and their professional breakup.
In turn, their parting of ways led Warwick to sue them for failure to honour their contract working with her on her music. It was finally settled out of court in 1979 for $5m (£4.1m).
In 1975, Bacharach worked briefly with David again, producing a Motown album together.
And in 1985, Warwick and Bacharach were reunited too, when she sang his hit That’s What Friends Are For.
Co-written with his then-wife Carole Bayer Sager, the track featured Elton John, Stevie Wonder, and Gladys Knight and went on to win 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 once more in 2000, on songs for film Isn’t She Great, based on the life of Valley Of The Dolls novelist Jacqueline Susann.
In the 1980s, Bacharach’s music inspired many of the songs coming 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 music resurgence, led by bands including Divine Comedy and The Mike Flowers Pops.
Named the “Sexiest Man Alive” by People Magazine in 2000, the noughties saw remixes and samples of his work high in 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 dedicated to his hits 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 had been forced to pull out of the event due to a shoulder injury.
Bacharach was awarded the Johnny Mercer Award, the highest honour in the Songwriters Hall of Fame In 1996.
Other honours include the George and Ira Gershwin Award for Musical Achievement from the University of California, Los Angeles, and a Grammy lifetime achievement award, where he was proclaimed music’s greatest living composer, in 2006.
A performer as well as a composer, Bacharach played concerts all over the world throughout his career, often accompanied by large orchestras.
Not known for his political songs, he made an exception in 2018 with Live To See Another Day, dedicated to the survivors of gun violence and with proceeds going to a charity run by the families of some of those killed in the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting.
In late 2022, a New York dance troop celebrated Bacharach’s music in an evening of dance titled The Look Of Love, named after one of his biggest hits.
Even his pastime of horseracing – he was an owner and breeder of thoroughbreds for over 30 years – was influenced by his love of music, naming one of his champion horses Heartlight No. One after his Neil Diamond collaboration, inspired by film E.T.
Bacharach was married four times, first to TV actress Paula Stuart between 1953 and 1958, then to actress Angie Dickinson between 1965 and 1980.
Bacharach and Dickinson had one 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 a son, Christopher.
His fourth and final marriage was to former ski-instructor Jane Hanson, 32 years his junior, with whom he has a son and a daughter – Oliver and Raleigh.
Bacharach is survived by ex-wives Dickinson and Bayer Sager, his wife Jane, and children Christopher, Oliver and Raleigh.
Several bands have pulled out from the Victorious music festival just hours before their scheduled performances, following claims by Irish folk group The Mary Wallopers that they were “cut off” for displaying a Palestinian flag.
The Last Dinner Party, Cliffords, and The Academic announced on Saturday that they would no longer be performing at the annual music festival in Portsmouth following Friday’s incident.
The organisers, who said the band’s set was cut short for using a “discriminatory” chant, have since apologised and promised to make “a substantial donation to humanitarian relief efforts for the Palestinian people”.
Rock band The Last Dinner Party said they are “outraged” by the incident and would boycott the festival.
“We are outraged by the decision made to silence The Mary Wallopers yesterday at Victorious. As a band we cannot cosign political censorship and will therefore be boycotting the festival today,” they said in a statement shared on their Instagram page.
“As Gazans are deliberately plunged into catastrophic famine after two years of escalating violence, it is urgent and obvious that artists use their platform to draw attention to the cause.
“To see an attempt to direct attention away from the genocide in order to maintain an apolitical image is immensely disappointing.”
Abigail Morris, Emily Roberts, Georgia Davies, Lizzie Mayland and Aurora Nishevci of The Last Dinner Party. File pic: Reuters
The Last Dinner Party said that throughout the summer, they have used their performances to encourage their audiences to make donations to a medical charity supporting Palestinians and urged their fans “more than ever to do the same”.
The band said they are “devastated to be put in this position” and apologised to those who were hoping to see them perform.
Following The Mary Wallopers’ set, a spokesperson for Victorious said: “We spoke to the artist before the performance regarding the festival’s long-standing policy of not allowing flags of any kind at the event, but that we respect their right to express their views during the show.
“Although a flag was displayed on stage contrary to our policy, and this was raised with the artist’s crew, the show was not ended at this point, and it was the artist’s decision to stop the song.”
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The Mary Wallopers claimed the festival had released a “misleading statement to the press claiming they cut our sound because of a discriminatory chant, and not the band’s call to Free Palestine”.
The band said their video “clearly shows a Victorious crew member coming on stage, interfering with our show, removing the flag from the stage and then the sound being cut following a chant of ‘Free Palestine'”.
“The same crew member is later heard in the video saying ‘you aren’t playing until the flag is removed’,” the band added.
Rock band The Academic have also pulled out of the festival, saying they could not “in good conscience” perform at “a festival that silences free speech”, while Irish band Cliffords said they “refuse to play if we are to be censored for showing our support to the people of Palestine”.
After the bands’ announcements that they were pulling out of the festival, the organisers released another statement, saying that they did not handle “the explanation of our policies sensitively or far enough in advance to allow a sensible conclusion to be reached”, and issued an apology.
Entertainment
Eva Victor: The ‘superstar’ who rose to fame creating viral videos on why comparisons are ‘unhelpful’ and new film Sorry, Baby
The creator of a new movie about the aftermath of sexual assault says comparisons with stars including Phoebe Waller-Bridge and Michaela Coel are flattering, but “aren’t ultimately helpful”.
Eva Victor, who rose to fame after creating viral comedy videos on X, wrote and directed their debut feature – Sorry, Baby – as well as playing the lead role.
They were encouraged to both write and then direct the movie by Oscar-winning filmmaker Barry Jenkins, after he saw Victor’s videos online.
Eva Victor, who first gained attention for their viral comedy videos, has released their first feature, Sorry, Baby. Pic: A24
The film was warmly received at Sundance and Cannes, and its creator was hailed a “superstar”. But along with such accolades come inevitable comparisons.
Victor told Sky News: “The thing that that moved us so much about [Fleabag star Phoebe Waller-Bridge] and about Michaela Coel and about Greta Gerwig and those people is that it’s just a true voice.”
Phoebe Waller-Bridge in 2024. Pic: PA
They admit “that part of the comparison means everything”, but go on: “I’m non-binary, so I use ‘they’ and ‘she’ pronouns and I think it’s interesting that we feel pretty binary about comparisons.
“People are pretty interested in putting me in a category of women. I mean, Denzel Washington directed himself. Albert Brooks directed himself. Jodie Foster directed after acting.
“It’s an interesting conversation, and I think maybe comparisons aren’t ultimately so helpful. But also, I’m very honoured because they’re people I desperately look up to. Overall, it’s a very, very fine comparison.“
Pic: A24
‘The bad thing’ at the heart of the movie
A triple threat, Victor studied acting and playwriting at Northwestern University, Illinois, before moving to New York in 2016 where they worked on the feminist satirical website Reductress. They later landed a role in Showtime drama series Billions.
A black comedy, Sorry, Baby tells the story of Agnes, a twenty-something New England literature student – and later academic – who is sexually assaulted by her college tutor.
Dubbed “the bad thing” in the movie, the assault – which occurs off camera – is a catalyst for the movie’s storyline but never becomes its focus.
Victor has called the writing of the project, “my soul on the page” – without speaking directly about whether any real-life experience inspired it – telling Sky News: “The process you go through privately, you’re exercising something very soul-forward. It’s very exposing.”
The impact of sexual assault around the world is something Victor calls “a big, big societal tragedy”. One in four women in England and Wales experiences sexual assault in their lifetime, according to the Office for National Statistics.
Victor says: “The reason I made the film was to try to make a film about an attempt at healing and much less about a kind of violence.”
They explain: “As someone who wanted to explore the intimate feelings of recovery from something like this, the only way through for me was to really think about Agnes and what is truthful to her story.”
Pic: A24
‘Less about violence, and more about love’
Several instances in the film show the system failing to effectively deal with or even fully acknowledge the abuse – first a hospital, then a university – and those scenes are handled with a lightness of touch not always applied to trauma-based stories.
Victor says: “Humour in those scenes is used as a way for punching up people in power. And these institutions that create a really difficult, painful time for people.”
In the current climate, as convicted sex offender Harvey Weinstein faces his third trial, and music star P Diddy awaits sentencing – where does Victor think the MeToo movement stands now?
Despite the movie’s themes, Victor is reticent to become a mouthpiece for the movement.
Measuring their words carefully, Victor offers a note of optimism in their answer – much like the message of the movie – looking to the future with hope, albeit in an imperfect world.
“I think there’s rehabilitation that is necessary for everyone, and I’m less interested in violence and punishment and much more interested in finding love and trying to hold each other.”
Sorry, Baby is in UK cinemas now.
Anyone feeling emotionally distressed or suicidal can call Samaritans for help on 116 123 or email jo@samaritans.org in the UK. In the US, call the Samaritans branch in your area or 1 (800) 273-TALK.
Entertainment
Bridgerton creator Shonda Rhimes reacts to claims of ‘woke’ casting – and why she’s considering moving to the UK
Bridgerton creator Shonda Rhimes says filming the drama and its spin-off Queen Charlotte in England has prompted her to consider relocating to the UK.
The US producer, who is behind some of the most popular TV dramas of the past two decades, told Sky News working in Britain had been a “really welcoming experience”, adding: “I’ve been spending a little bit more time over here and I’m going to try to spend even more if I can swap my kids into a British school.
“I’m trying to figure that part out, but I do really love being here and it’s always been such a great experience.”
Rege-Jean Page and Phoebe Dynevor as Simon Basset and Daphne Bridgerton in Bridgerton. Pic: Netflix
Rhimes’ vast contribution to television has been recognised at this year’s Edinburgh TV festival, where she was given its inaugural fellowship award for the global impact of her shows.
Her first huge hit was Grey’s Anatomy. The medical drama, which began in 2005, is now in its 22nd season.
Shonda Rhimes created Grey’s Anatomy. Pic: ABC/Kobal/Shutterstock
But finding an abandoned novel in a hotel room would motivate her to write Bridgerton, the drama that has become the biggest show on Netflix.
While its steamier scenes are often what garner most attention, she says after reading the books, she came to see it as a “workplace drama”.
“These are women in their workplace because, in a world in which they have no power, they have no ability to do anything else; their only value is who they marry and their only worth is focused into that,” she adds.
‘Bizarre’ criticism
Rhimes says she is thinking about moving to the UK
Rhimes agrees there is something inherently condescending about the way critics use terms like “guilty pleasure” to describe her dramas.
“There are certain people for whom the world of women will never be considered as serious or as complex or as interesting as the world of men,” she says.
Rhimes says she finds some of the reaction to her decision to reflect a diverse range of actors in Bridgerton’s cast “bizarre” after critics accused the show’s makers of “pandering to woke culture”.
Bridgerton has been one of Netflix’s most popular shows. Pic: Netflix
She said: “The idea that I am writing the show looking like I look, that it wouldn’t occur to me that there should be more people in the show who look like me, I feel like that’s an obvious point. Why would I write something that doesn’t include me in any way?”
Given the thousands of episodes of drama she’s written over the years, she’s all too aware that it’s likely artificial intelligence is probably being used to scrape her scripts.
“There’s a danger of AI learning from my episodes, maybe it will learn to be better at what it does, but, most importantly, I don’t think that there’s any substitute for that germ of creativity that comes from a human imagination, I really don’t.”
As for what she enjoys watching on TV, her eyes light up when I mention having heard she’s a massive fan of a certain British sci-fi classic.
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“Oh my God, I’ve loved Doctor Who forever! Forever!” she says, describing writer Russell T Davies’ work as “amazing”.
She adds: “For a while, people were like ‘what’s wrong with you?’ because they didn’t know the show. I fell in love with the David Tennant years, and I haven’t been able to let it go because of the writing.”
I ask if she’s ever considered a crossover episode.
She laughs: “I don’t know if there’s a Bridgerton meets Doctor Who…, but I would work with Russell at any time.”
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