Benny Andersson

Goran Bror Benny Andersson is a Swedish musician, composer, member of the Swedish music group ABBA (1972-1982), and co-composer of the musicals Chess, Kristina från Duvemaa, and Mamma Mia!. For the 2008 film version of Mamma Mia!, he worked also as an executive producer. Since 2001, he is active with his own band Benny Anderssons orkester.

The group's breakthrough came with winning the Eurovision Song Contest for Sweden with "Waterloo" on 6 April 1974. During the next eight years, Andersson (together with Ulvaeus) wrote music for and produced eight studio albums with ABBA. The group achieved great success globally and scored a chain of No. 1 hits.

Harold Arlen

Harold Arlen was an American composer of popular music, having written over 500 songs, a number of which have become known worldwide. In addition to composing the songs for the 1939 film The Wizard of Oz (lyrics by E.Y. Harburg), including the classic "Over the Rainbow", Arlen is a highly regarded contributor to the Great American Songbook. "Over the Rainbow" was voted the twentieth century's No. 1 song by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) and the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA).

Howard Ashman

Howard Elliott Ashman was an American playwright and lyricist. He collaborated with Alan Menken on several works and is most widely known for several animated feature films for Disney, for which Ashman wrote the lyrics and Menken composed the music. Ashman and Menken began their collaboration with the musical God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater (1979), for which Ashman directed and wrote both book and lyrics. Their next musical, Little Shop of Horrors (1982) for which Ashman again directed and wrote both book and lyrics, became a long-running success and led to a 1986 feature film. The partnership's first Disney film was The Little Mermaid (1989), followed by Beauty and the Beast (1991). After his death, some of Ashman's songs were included in another Disney film, Aladdin.

Burt Bacharach

Burt Bacharach is, quite simply, one of the most accomplished composers of the 20th Century. In the '60s and '70s, Bacharach was a dominant figure in popular music, writing a remarkable 52 Top 40 hits. In terms of musical sophistication, Bacharach's compositions differed from much of the pop music of the era. Bacharach songs typically boasted memorable melodies, unconventional and shifting time signatures, and unique chord changes. Combining elements of jazz, pop, Brazilian music and rock, Bacharach created a unique new sound that was as contemporary as it was popular. Lyricist Hal David, Bacharach's primary collaborator, infused Bacharach's music with tart, melodramatic lyrics worthy of the best Tin Pan Alley composers. David's bittersweet, unsentimental lyrics were often in striking contrast to Bacharach's soaring melodies. While in the late 1970s Bacharach's name became synonymous with elevator music (due in great part to its sheer familiarity), a closer listening suggests that his meticulously crafted, technically sophisticated compositions are anything but easy listening.

Lionel Bart

He was born Lionel Begleiter, the youngest of seven surviving children of Galician Jews, Yetta (nee Darumstundler) and Morris Begleiter, a master tailor. He grew up in Stepney; his father worked in the area as a tailor in a garden shed. He started his songwriting career in amateur theatre, first at The International Youth Centre in 1952 where he and a friend wrote a revue together called IYC Revue 52. The following year the pair auditioned for a production of the Leonard Irwin play The Wages of Eve at London's Unity Theatre. Shortly afterward Bart began composing songs for Unity Theatre productions, contributing material (including the title song) to its 1953 revue Turn It Up, and songs for its 1953 pantomime, an agitprop version of Cinderella. While at the Unity he was talent-spotted by Joan Littlewood, and so joined Theatre Workshop. He also wrote comedy songs for the Sunday lunchtime BBC radio programme The Billy Cotton Band Show.

Irving Berlin

Meet the man who wrote "God Bless America". His name was Irving Berlin, one of the greatest American songwriters of his time. His life began in a foreign country, as one of eight children of Leah and Moses Baline. He grew up and greatly impacted society from the many famous songs and plays he wrote, while most of them are still very popular today. We are talking about the man who started out in a poor town in Russia, then came to the United States and made it big.

Irving Berlin was born under the name Israel Isidore Baline on May 11, 1888 in Mogilyov, Russia. He came to America with his family at age five to escape the pogroms in Russia. The family settled in New York City, where Israel and his brothers sold cheap newspapers on the street to support their family after the death of his father. Not long after, he became a singing waiter, which started him off in the singing business. Israel began composing songs. He couldn't read music, but taught himself to play piano enough so he could write his own music.

Jim Brickman

Jim Brickman's distinctive piano style and captivating live performances have revolutionized the popularity of instrumental music, making him a driving force behind modern American music.

The hit-making songwriter is the best-selling solo pianist of our time earning 21 Number One albums and 32 Top 20 Radio Singles in the industry bible, "Billboard Magazine." He's garnered two Grammy nominations, gospel music's Dove Award, two SESAC Songwriter of the Year Awards, and the Canadian Country Music Award. He also has a music scholarship named for him by his alma mater, the prestigious Cleveland Institute of Music.

"Hope," "Faith" and "Peace" are truly at the heart of Jim Brickman's passionate songwriting. "I write music to be shared - to soothe, to inspire, to celebrate, to love. To me, music is the pure and simple soundtrack to life's most memorable moments."

Leslie Bricusse

Bricusse was educated at University College School in London and Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge. In the 1960s and 1970s, Bricusse enjoyed a fruitful partnership with Anthony Newley. They wrote the musical Stop the World - I Want to Get Off (1961) which was successful in London and on Broadway, and was made into a (poorly received) film version in 1966. Also in collaboration with Newley, Bricusse wrote The Roar of the Greasepaint-the Smell of the Crowd (1965) and Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory (1971), based on the children's book by Roald Dahl, and for which they received an Academy Award nomination for Best Original Song Score. When he collaborated with Newley, the two men referred to themselves as the team of "Brickman and Newburg", with "Newburg" concentrating mainly on the music and "Brickman" on the lyrics. Ian Fraser often did their arrangements.

Sammy Cahn

Sammy Cahn was an American lyricist, songwriter and musician. He is best known for his romantic lyrics to films and Broadway songs, as well as stand-alone songs premiered by recording companies in the Greater Los Angeles Area. He and his collaborators had a series of hit recordings with Frank Sinatra during the singer's tenure at Capitol Records, but also enjoyed hits with Dean Martin, Doris Day and many others. He played the piano and violin. He won the Academy Award four times for his songs, including the popular song "Three Coins in the Fountain".

Among his most enduring songs is "Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!", cowritten with Jule Styne in 1945.

Hoagy Carmichael

"I wore my hat on the back of my head and no tie, with a cigarette drooping from my lips, and I lazied through the entire performance," Hoagy said, describing his historic, record-breaking performance at the London Palladium in 1951. That was the image Hoagy created and the world embraced. Behind it, invisible, was someone else--the passionate and poetic young man he'd once been, the poor kid from Indiana with a fierce ache to succeed.

Eric Clapton

Eric Patrick Clapton, CBE, is an English rock and blues guitarist, singer, and songwriter. He is the only three-time inductee to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame: once as a solo artist and separately as a member of the Yardbirds and Cream. Clapton has been referred to as one of the most important and influential guitarists of all time. Clapton ranked second in Rolling Stone magazine's list of the "100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time" and fourth in Gibson's "Top 50 Guitarists of All Time" He was also named number five in Time magazine's list of "The 10 Best Electric Guitar Players" in 2009.

Cy Coleman

Coleman was born Seymour Kaufman on June 14, 1929, in New York City to Eastern European Jewish parents, and was raised in the Bronx. His mother, Ida (nee Prizent) was an apartment landlady and his father was a brickmason. He was a child prodigy who gave piano recitals at Steinway Hall, Town Hall, and Carnegie Hall between the ages of six and nine. Before beginning his fabled Broadway career, he led the Cy Coleman Trio, which made many recordings and was a much-in-demand club attraction.

Phil Collins

While other major artists trudge painfully through a handful of over promoted releases each decade; this drummer/actor/singer/producer has been constantly active in all manner of contradictory and unlikely projects. His history with Genesis is well documented from their art-house beginnings to multi-platinum status as the band grew up, lost Steve Hackett and then Peter Gabriel and ended up making videos with tongues firmly in their cheeks. Collins launched his solo career twenty nine years ago with "Face Value" ('81), followed by "Hello, I Must Be Going" ('82), "No Jacket Required" ('85), "...But Seriously" ('89), "Both Sides" ('93), "Dance Into The Light" ('96) and "Testify" ('02) picking up numerous awards including 7 Grammy's, 2 Oscar nominations and a Golden Globe for "Two Hearts". After leaving Genesis in 1996 he released a "Hits" album in 1998. Between Phil's solo and Genesis recordings and excluding his other activities, Phil has sold over 200 million records.

Hal David

David was born in New York City, a son of Austrian Jewish immigrants Lina (nee Goldberg) and Gedalier David, who owned a delicatessen in Brooklyn, and younger brother of American lyricist and songwriter Mack David. He is credited with popular music lyrics, beginning in the 1940s with material written for bandleader Sammy Kaye and for Guy Lombardo. He worked with Morty Nevins of The Three Suns on four songs for the feature film Two Gals and a Guy (1951), starring Janis Paige and Robert Alda. he same name.

David and Bacharach were awarded the 2011 Gershwin Prize for Popular Song, bestowed by the Library of Congress, the first time a songwriting team was given the honor. David was recuperating from a recent illness and was unable to attend the Washington D.C. presentation ceremony in May 2012.

Lamont Dozier

Lamont Herbert Dozier is an American songwriter and record producer, born in Detroit, Michigan. Dozier has co-written and produced 14 US Billboard #1 hits and 4 number ones in the UK.

Dozier is best known as a member of Holland-Dozier-Holland, the songwriting and production team responsible for much of the Motown sound and numerous hit records by artists such as Martha and the Vandellas, The Supremes, The Four Tops, and The Isley Brothers. Along with Brian Holland, Dozier served as the team's musical arranger and producer, whilst Eddie Holland concentrated mainly on lyrics and vocal production.

Billie Eilish

Billie Eilish Pirate Baird O'Connell is an American singer and songwriter. She first gained public attention in 2015 with her debut single "Ocean Eyes", which was subsequently released by Darkroom, an imprint of Interscope Records. The song was written and produced by her brother, Finneas O'Connell, with whom she frequently collaborates on music and in live shows. Her debut extended play, Don't Smile at Me (2017), was commercially successful and charted within the top 15 in the US, UK, Canada, and Australia.

Eilish has received several accolades, including seven Grammy Awards, two American Music Awards, one Guinness World Record, a Golden Globe Award, three MTV Video Music Awards, and two Brit Awards. She is the youngest artist in Grammy history and second overall to win all four general field categories-Best New Artist, Record of the Year, Song of the Year, and Album of the Year-in the same year. She was named in Time magazine's inaugural Time 100 Next list in 2019, and made it into the main Time 100 list in 2021. According to the RIAA and Billboard, Eilish is the 26th-highest-certified digital singles artist and one of the most successful artists of the 2010s.(

Duke Ellington

Born 29 April 1899 in Washington DC, composer, bandleader, and pianist Edward Kennedy ("Duke") Ellington was recognized in his lifetime as one of the greatest jazz composers and performers. Nicknamed "Duke" by a boyhood friend who admired his regal air, the name stuck and became indelibly associated with the finest creations in big band and vocal jazz. A genius for instrumental combinations, improvisation, and jazz arranging brought the world the unique "Ellington" sound that found consummate expression in works like "Mood Indigo," "Sophisticated Lady," and the symphonic suites Black, Brown, and Beige (which he subtitled "a Tone Parallel to the History of the Negro in America") and Harlem ("a Tone Parallel to Harlem").

George Gershwin

George Gershwin (September 26, 1898 - July 11, 1937) was an American composer and pianist.Gershwin's compositions spanned both popular and classical genres, and his most popular melodies are widely known. Among his best known works are the orchestral compositions Rhapsody in Blue (1924) and An American in Paris (1928), as well as the opera, Porgy and Bess (1935).

He wrote most of his vocal and theatrical works, including more than a dozen Broadway shows, in collaboration with his elder brother, lyricist Ira Gershwin.

George Gershwin composed music for both Broadway and the classical concert hall, as well as popular songs that brought his work to an even wider public. His compositions have been used in numerous films and on television, and many became jazz standards recorded in numerous variations. Countless singers and musicians have recorded Gershwin songs.

Ira Gershwin

Gershwin was born Israel Gershowitz in New York City, the oldest of four children of Morris (Moishe) and Rose Gershovitz (nee Rosa Bruskin), who were Russian Jews, born in St Petersburg, who had emigrated to the US in 1891. Ira's siblings were George, and Frances. Morris changed the family name to "Gershwine" (or alternatively "Gershvin") well before their children rose to fame; it was not spelled "Gershwin" until later.

It was not until 1924 that Ira and George teamed up to write the music for what became their first Broadway hit Lady, Be Good. Once the brothers joined forces, their combined talents became one of the most influential forces in the history of American Musical Theatre. "When the Gershwins teamed up to write songs for Lady, Be Good, the American musical found its native idiom." Together, they wrote the music for more than 12 shows and four films.

Barry Gibb

Gibb's career has spanned over 60 years. In 1994, he was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame with his brothers. In 1997, as a member of the Bee Gees, he was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and received the Brit Award for Outstanding Contribution to Music. He is a fellow of the British Academy of Songwriters, Composers and Authors. In 2007, Q magazine ranked him number 38 on its list of the "100 Greatest Singers". Gibb was appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 2002 New Year Honours for services to music and entertainment, and a Knight Bachelor in the 2018 New Year Honours for services to music and charity. He was also made an Honorary Companion of the Order of Australia on 27 January 2022, in the 2022 Special Honours, for eminent service to the performing arts as a musician, songwriter, and record producer, to the advancement of Australian music artists, and to philanthropy

Richard Greene

Richard Bob Greene is an award-winning composer, arranger, singer, writer and producer. As the co-founder and creator of the nu-wave a Cappella super group The Bobs, Greene fractured and reconstructed the rules for popular music. He was nominated for a Grammy for his and Gunnar Madsen's a Cappella arrangement of the Beatles "Helter Skelter". As a composer and songwriter/librettist, Greene has received commissions from Lincoln Center, the Los Angeles Theater Center, the Minnesota Opera, Oberlin Dance Collective, ISO Dance Theater, National Public Radio and many others.

Marvin Hamlisch

Marvin Hamlisch was born in Manhattan, to Viennese-born Jewish parents Lilly (nee Schachter) and Max Hamlisch. His father was an accordionist and bandleader. Hamlisch was a child prodigy, and, by age five, he began mimicking the piano music he heard on the radio. A few months before he turned seven, in 1951, he was accepted into what is now the Juilliard School Pre-College Division. His first job was as a rehearsal pianist for Funny Girl with Barbra Streisand. Shortly afterward, he was hired by producer Sam Spiegel to play piano at Spiegel's parties. This connection led to his first film score, The Swimmer. His favorite musicals growing up were My Fair Lady, Gypsy, West Side Story, and Bye Bye Birdie.Hamlisch attended Queens College, earning his Bachelor of Arts degree in 1967Hamlisch was one of only twelve people to win Emmy, Grammy, Oscar and Tony awards. This collection of all four is referred to as an "EGOT". He is one of only two people (along with Richard Rodgers) to have won those four prizes and a Pulitzer Prize.

Oscar Hammerstein

His grandfather, Oscar Hammerstein I, was an opera impresario, and his uncle was a successful Broadway producer. While a college student, the younger Hammerstein wrote and performed in several varsity shows at Columbia University. His first musical, Always You, for which he wrote the book and lyrics, opened on Broadway in 1921. He was co-writer of the popular Rudolf Friml operetta Rose-Marie, and then began a successful collaboration with composer Jerome Kern on Sunny, which was a great hit. Their most successful collaboration, though was the 1927 musical Show Boat, which is considered to be one of the masterpieces of the American musical theatre. Hammerstein continued to work with Kern and operetta composer Sigmund Romberg, among others, over the next several years on shows such as Sweet Adeline, Music in the Air, and Very Warm for May, a critical failure which nevertheless contained one of Kern and Hammerstein's loveliest songs, 'All the Things You Are.'

George Harrison

George Harrison, MBE was an English guitarist, singer-songwriter, and producer who achieved international fame as the lead guitarist of The Beatles. Often referred to as "the quiet Beatle", Harrison embraced Hinduism and helped broaden the horizons of his fellow band mates as well as their American audience by incorporating Indian instrumentation in their music. Although most of the Beatles' songs were written by John Lennon and Paul McCartney, most Beatles albums from 1965 onwards contained at least two Harrison compositions. His songs for the group included "Taxman", "Within You Without You", "While My Guitar Gently Weeps", "Here Comes the Sun" and "Something", the last of which became the Beatles' second-most covered song.

Lorenz Hart

Lorenz Milton Hart was the lyricist half of the Broadway songwriting team Rodgers and Hart. Some of his more famous lyrics include "Blue Moon," "Mountain Greenery," "The Lady Is a Tramp," "Manhattan," "Where or When," "Bewitched, Bothered, and Bewildered," "Falling in Love with Love," "My Funny Valentine," "I Could Write a Book", "This Can't Be Love", "With a Song in My Heart", "It Never Entered My Mind", and "Isn't It Romantic?". Hart was born in Harlem, the elder of two sons, to Jewish immigrant parents, Max M. and Frieda (Isenberg) Hart, of German background. His father, a business promoter, sent Hart and his brother to private schools

Jerry Herman

Jerry Herman was an American composer and lyricist, known for his work in Broadway musical theater. He composed the scores for the hit Broadway musicals Hello, Dolly!, Mame, and La Cage aux Folles. He has been nominated for the Tony Award five times, and won twice, for Hello, Dolly! and La Cage aux Folles. In 2009, Herman received the Tony Award for Lifetime Achievement in the Theatre. He is a recipient of the 2010 Kennedy Center Honors.

In 1960, Herman made his Broadway debut with the revue From A to Z, which featured contributions from newcomers Woody Allen and Fred Ebb as well. In 1964, producer David Merrick united Herman with musical actress Carol Channing and librettist Michael Stewart for a project that was to become one of his more successful, Hello, Dolly!. The original production ran for 2,844 performances, the longest running musical for its time, and was later revived three times. Although facing stiff competition from Funny Girl, Hello, Dolly! swept the Tony Awards that season, winning 10, a record that remained unbroken for 37 years, until The Producers won 12 Tonys in 2001.

Jimmy Van Heusen

Jimmy Van Heusen was inarguably one of the most accomplished songwriters in history. Claiming four "Oscars" and one Emmy award among his credits he also wrote more songs (85) recorded by Frank Sinatra, his long time friend, than any other composer. He also composed the songs for another good friend, Bing Crosby for six of the seven Crosby/Hope Road pictures. In spite of such accolades he personally felt one of his biggest honors was being elected by his peers as one of the original inductees to the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1971. Most of his songs were written with two lyricist partners Johnny Burke (1940 to 1953) and then Sammy Cahn.

Brian Holland

Brian Holland is an American songwriter and record producer, best known as a member of Holland-Dozier-Holland, the songwriting and production team that was responsible for much of the Motown sound and numerous hit records by artists such as Martha and the Vandellas, The Supremes, The Four Tops, and The Isley Brothers. Holland, along with Lamont Dozier, served as the team's musical arranger and producer. He has written or co-written 145 hits in US and 78 in the UK.

Holland has also had an on-and-off career as a performer. He released a solo single in 1958 under the name of "Briant Holland". He and longtime friend and future songwriting partner Freddie Gorman were in a short-lived group called the Fidalatones, and he was later (1960-62) a member of the Motown recording act The Satintones as well as being a member of the Rayber Voices, a quartet that backed up several early Motown recording acts. He partnered with Lamont Dozier under the name "Holland-Dozier", releasing a lone single for Motown in 1963, then was inactive for a number of years, and was then revived in the early and mid-1970s, scoring a number of medium-sized R&B hits. Holland resumed his solo recording career in 1974, hitting the charts as a solo artist in '74 and '75.

Billy Joel

Joel recorded many popular hit songs and albums from 1973 (beginning with the single "Piano Man") to his retirement from recording pop music in 1993. He is one of the very few rock or even pop artists to have Top 10 hits in the '70s, '80s, and '90s. A six-time Grammy Award winner, he has sold in excess of 100 million records worldwide and is the sixth best selling artist in the United States, according to the RIAA. Joel's induction into the Songwriter's Hall of Fame (Class of 1992), the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame (Class of 1999), and the Long Island Music Hall of Fame (Class of 2006) has further solidified his status as one of America's leading music icons. He has continued to tour occasionally (sometimes with Elton John) in addition to writing and recording classical music.

Sir Elton John

Sir Elton John is one of pop music's great survivors. Born 25 March, 1947, as Reginald Kenneth Dwight, he started to play the piano at the early age of four. At the age of 11, he won a scholarship to the Royal Academy of Music. His first band was called Bluesology. He later auditioned (unsuccessfully) as lead singer for the progressive rock bands King Crimson and Gentle Giant. Dwight teamed up with lyricist Bernie Taupin and changed his name to Elton John (merging the names of saxophonist Elton Dean and Long John Baldry). The duo wrote songs for Lulu and Roger Cook. In the early 1970s, he recorded the concept album "Tumbleweed Connection." He became the most successful pop artist of the 1970s, and he has survived many different pop fads including punk, the New Romantics and Britpop to remain one of Britain's most internationally acclaimed musicians.

Jerome Kern

Jerome David Kern was born in 1885. He began his stage career grafting American songs (for which he wrote the music) into imported European operettas. His breakthrough came with the song "They Didn't Believe Me", written (with lyrics by Edward Laska) for a show called "The Girl from Utah". It established him as a major American composer in 1914. Married to a Englishwoman, Kern became an Anglophile, and teamed up with British writers Guy Bolton and P.G. Wodehouse to write the so-called "Princess Theatre musicals"--shows like "Very Good, Eddie" and "Leave It To Jane", which were unusual not so much for their silly storylines but for the fact that the characters were everyday people rather than the exotic characters of operetta, and also for the fact that these shows had few sets and small casts. He later wrote shows like "Sally" and "Sunny", both loaded with song hits, star casts and spectacular sets but silly plots.

Carole King

King's career began in the 1960s when she, along with her then husband Gerry Goffin, wrote more than two dozen chart hits for numerous artists, many of which have become standards. She has continued writing for other artists since then. King's success as a performer in her own right did not come until the 1970s, when she sang her own songs, accompanying herself on the piano, in a series of albums and concerts. After experiencing commercial disappointment with her debut album Writer, King scored her breakthrough with the album Tapestry, which topped the U.S. album chart for 15 weeks in 1971 and remained on the charts for more than six years.

Cyndi Lauper

Cynthia Ann Stephanie "Cyndi" Lauper is an American singer, songwriter, actress and LGBT rights activist. Her career has spanned over 30 years.Her debut solo album She's So Unusual (1983) was the first debut female album to chart four top-five hits on the Billboard Hot 100-"Girls Just Want to Have Fun", "Time After Time", "She Bop", and "All Through the Night"-and earned Lauper the Best New Artist award at the 27th Grammy Awards in 1985. Her success continued with the soundtrack for the motion picture The Goonies and her second record True Colors (1986). This album included the number one single "True Colors" and "Change of Heart", which peaked at number 3.

Jerry Leiber

Lyricist Jerome Leiber and composer Michael Stoller were American songwriting and record producing partners. They found success as the writers of such crossover hit songs as "Hound Dog" and "Kansas City". Later in the 1950s, particularly through their work with The Coasters, they created a string of ground-breaking hits - including "Young Blood", "Searchin'", and "Yakety Yak" - that used the humorous vernacular of teenagers sung in a style that was openly theatrical rather than personal. They were the first to surround black music with elaborate production values, enhancing its emotional power with the Drifters in "There Goes My Baby", which influenced Phil Spector, who studied their productions while playing guitar on their sessions.

John Lennon

John Winston Ono Lennon, MBE was an English singer and songwriter who rose to worldwide fame as a co-founder of the Beatles, the most commercially successful band in the history of popular music. With fellow member Paul McCartney, he formed a celebrated songwriting partnership.

Born and raised in Liverpool, Lennon became involved in the skiffle craze as a teenager; his first band, the Quarrymen, evolved into the Beatles in 1960. When the group disbanded in 1970, Lennon embarked on a solo career that produced the critically acclaimed albums John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band and Imagine, and iconic songs such as "Give Peace a Chance", "Working Class Hero", and "Imagine". After his marriage to Yoko Ono in 1969, he changed his name to John Ono Lennon. Lennon disengaged himself from the music business in 1975 to raise his infant son Sean, but re-emerged with Ono in 1980 with the new album Double Fantasy. He was murdered three weeks after its release.

Alan Jay Lerner

(born Aug. 31, 1918, New York, N.Y., U.S. - died June 14, 1986, New York City) U.S. librettist and lyricist. Born to a prosperous retailing family, he studied at Juilliard and Harvard. He wrote more than 500 radio scripts between 1940 and 1942, the year he met the composer Frederick Loewe. The two began collaborating, and their first Broadway success came with Brigadoon (1947; film, 1954). It was followed by Paint Your Wagon (1951; film, 1969). My Fair Lady (1956) was an unprecedented triumph, setting a record for the longest original run of any musical; the film version (1964) won seven Academy Awards. Their film musical Gigi (1958) received nine Academy Awards. Camelot followed in 1960 (film, 1967). Lerner also collaborated with Kurt Weill (Love Life, 1948) and Burton Lane (On a Clear Day You Can See Forever, 1965; film, 1970), among others. His film scripts include An American in Paris (1951, Academy Award).

Frank Loesser

Frank Loesser has been called the most versatile of all Broadway composers. His five Broadway musicals, each a unique contribution to the art of the American musical theater, were as different from each other as they were from the theater of their day: Where's Charley?, Guys And Dolls, The Most Happy Fella, Greenwillow and How To Succeed In Business Without Really Trying. Long before he wrote Where's Charley?, he was already known to America from the dozens of songs that had become enormous popular hits from his Hollywood career. He had supplied lyrics to the music of such greats as Jule Styne, Hoagy Carmichael, Burton Lane and Arthur Schwartz, among others, penning such standards as "On a Slow Boat to China," "Two Sleepy People," "Heart and Soul," "I Don't Want to Walk Without You," "Spring Will Be a Little Late this Year," "(See What) The Boys in the Backroom (Will Have)," "They're Either Too Young or Too Old" and his 1948 Academy Award winner, "Baby, It's Cold Outside."

Frederick Loewe

Frederick Loewe was born on June 10, 1901 in Berlin to Viennese parents, Edmond and Rosa. His father, Edmond Loewe, was a very famous musical star who traveled considerably, including North and South America, and much of Europe. Fritz grew up in Berlin and attended a Prussian cadet school from the age of five until he was thirteen. He hated the school because his parents would leave him there while they toured worldwide. One of Fritz's most bitter memories was spending even the Christmas holidays at school with two or three other boys. He never cared for Christmas very much because of that experience.

By the age of seven or eight, Fritz learned by ear and played on piano, every new song his father rehearsed for a new musical in which he was appearing. He was able to play the entire score and help his father in rehearsals. This impressed his father greatly, and Edmond suggested giving Fritz music lessons. His mother, however, was never moved by Fritz's talent, saying; "Oh, they all do that!"

Fritz eventually did attend a famous conservatory in Berlin, one year behind the virtuoso Claudio Arrau. Both won the coveted Hollander Medal, awarded by the school, and Fritz gave performances as a concert pianist while still in Germany.

Robert Lopez

Robert Lopez is an American songwriter of musicals, best known for co-creating The Book of Mormon and Avenue Q, and for composing the songs featured in the Disney animated film Frozen. He is the youngest of only twelve people who have won an Emmy, a Grammy, an Oscar and a Tony Award, and the quickest (10 years) to win all four. Robert Lopez was born in Manhattan to Frank and Katherine Lopez. He is partly of Filipino descent through his father, Frank; his paternal grandfather was Filipino and his paternal grandmother was Filipino and Scottish-American. His father eventually became director of publications for NYU Langone Medical Center.

In 1999, Lopez and Marx, who collaborated on both music and lyrics, began work on Avenue Q, a stage musical which, using puppet characters, similar to those on Sesame Street, dealt with adult themes and ideas. The show, for which Lopez also provided the animated segments, was his first professional experience. After playing Off-Broadway, the show transferred in July 2003 to Broadway's John Golden Theatre, where it proved both a critical and popular success, winning the 2004 Tony Award for Best Musical, and earning Lopez and Marx the Tony Award for Best Original Score. The Original Cast Recording was nominated for a Grammy Award in 2004.

Henry Mancini

Enrico Nicola "Henry" Mancini was an American composer, conductor and arranger, who is best remembered for his film and television scores. Often cited as one of the greatest composers in the history of film, he won four Academy Awards, a Golden Globe, and twenty Grammy Awards, plus a posthumous Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 1995.

His best known works include the jazz-idiom theme to The Pink Panther film series ("The Pink Panther Theme"), his "Moon River" to Breakfast at Tiffany's, and the theme to the Peter Gunn television series. The Peter Gunn theme won the first Grammy Award for Album of the Year. Mancini also had a long collaboration on film scores with the film director Blake Edwards

Mancini was nominated for an unprecedented 72 Grammys, winning 20. Additionally he was nominated for 18 Academy Awards, winning four) He also won a Golden Globe Award and was nominated for two Emmys.

Johnny Marks

John David Marks was an American songwriter. He specialized in Christmas songs and wrote many holiday standards, including "Rudolph, the Red-Nosed Reindeer" (a hit for Gene Autry and others), "Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree" (a hit for Brenda Lee), "A Holly Jolly Christmas" (recorded by the Quinto Sisters and later by Burl Ives), "Silver and Gold" (for Burl Ives), "I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day" (introduced by Bing Crosby), and "Run Rudolph Run" (recorded by Chuck Berry). In addition to his songwriting, he founded St. Nicholas Music in 1949, and served as director of ASCAP from 1957 to 1961. In 1981, he was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame

Sir Paul McCartney

Sir James Paul McCartney, MBE is an English singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and composer. With John Lennon, George Harrison, and Ringo Starr, he gained worldwide fame as the bassist of the rock band the Beatles, one of the most popular and influential groups in the history of pop music; his songwriting partnership with Lennon is one of the most celebrated of the 20th century. After the band's break-up, he pursued a solo career and formed Wings with his first wife, Linda, and Denny Laine.

McCartney has been recognised as one of the most successful composers and performers of all time.(2) More than 2,200 artists have covered his Beatles song "Yesterday", more than any other copyrighted song in history. Wings' 1977 release "Mull of Kintyre" is one of the all-time best-selling singles in the UK. A two-time inductee into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame (as a member of the Beatles in 1988, and as a solo artist in 1999),(3) and a 21-time Grammy Award winner (having won both individually and with the Beatles), McCartney has written, or co-written, 32 songs that have reached number one on the Billboard Hot 100, and as of 2009 he has 25.5 million RIAA-certified units in the United States. McCartney, Lennon, Harrison and Starr received MBEs in 1965, and in 1997, McCartney was knighted for his services to music.

Bobby McFerrin

On the 11th of March, 1950, Bobby McFerrin was born. His parents were classical singers and he began to study music theory early on in his life. His family then moved to Los Angeles. During high school and then in College, UCSC, he focused on the piano. Once he finished college, Bobby McFerrin toured with numerous bands including the Ice Follies.

However, it was only in 1977 that Bobby McFerrin decide to become a singer. At one point he met Bill Cosby who arranged for him take part in the 1980 Playboy Jazz Festival. It was only two years later where he released his firm album called "Bobby McFerrin" in 1982. It was in 1983, that Bobby McFerrin started converting without a band. This eventually led him to make a solo tour in Germany. It was in Germany that he recorded his album "The Voice". From that point on, he continued to make solo tours in the most prestigious locations. It is also important to realize that Bobby McFerrin worked with several important people like Garrison Keillor, Jack Nicholson, and Joe Zawinul. On "Another Night in Tunisia", Bobby McFerrin won two Grammies.

Sarah McLachlan

Sarah McLachlan was adopted in Halifax, Nova Scotia. As a child, she took voice lessons, along with studies in classical piano and guitar. When she was 17 years old, and still a student at Queen Elizabeth High School, she fronted a short-lived rock band called The October Game. One of the band's songs, "Grind", credited as a group composition, can be found on the independent Flamingo Records release 'Out of the Fog' and the CD Out of the Fog Too. It has yet to be released elsewhere. Her high school yearbook predicted that she was "destined to become a famous rock star."

Following The October Game's first concert at Dalhousie University opening for Moev, McLachlan was offered a recording contract with Vancouver-based independent record label Nettwerk by Moev's Mark Jowett. McLachlan's parents insisted she finish high school and complete one year of studies at the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design before moving to Vancouver and embarking on a new life as a recording artist, and McLachlan finally signed to Nettwerk two years later before having written a single song.

Alan Menken

Alan Irwin Menken is an American musical theatre and film composer and pianist. Menken is best known for his scores for films produced by Walt Disney Animation Studios. His scores for The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, and Pocahontas have each won him two Academy Awards. He also composed the scores for Little Shop of Horrors (1986), Newsies (1992), The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1996), Hercules (1997), Enchanted (2007) and Tangled (2010), among others. He is also known for his work on musical theatre works for Broadway and elsewhere. Some of these are based on his Disney films, but other stage hits include Little Shop of Horrors (1982), A Christmas Carol (1994) and Sister Act (2009).

Menken has collaborated with such lyricists as Howard Ashman, Tim Rice, Glenn Slater, Stephen Schwartz and David Zippel. With eight Academy Award wins (four each for Best Score and Best Original Song), Menken is the second most prolific Oscar winner in the music categories after Alfred Newman, who has nine Oscars. He has also won eleven Grammy Awards, a Tony Award and other honors.

Johnny Mercer

John Herndon "Johnny" Mercer was an American lyricist, songwriter and singer. He was also the founder of Capitol Records.

He is best known as a lyricist, but he also composed music. He was also a popular singer who recorded his own songs as well as those written by others. From the mid-1930s through the mid-1950s, many of the songs Mercer wrote and performed were among the most popular hits of the time. He wrote the lyrics to more than fifteen hundred songs, including compositions for movies and Broadway shows. He received nineteen Academy Award nominations, and won four Best Original Song Oscars.

Freddie Mercury

Freddie Mercury (born Farrokh Bulsara) was a British singer, songwriter and record producer, known as the lead vocalist and co-principal songwriter of the rock band Queen. He also became known for his flamboyant stage persona and four-octave vocal range.(3)(4)(5) Mercury wrote and composed numerous hits for Queen ("Bohemian Rhapsody," "Killer Queen," "Somebody to Love," "Don't Stop Me Now," "Crazy Little Thing Called Love," and "We Are the Champions."); occasionally served as a producer and guest musician (piano or vocals) for other artists; and concurrently led a solo career while performing with Queen.

Mercury was born of Parsi descent in the Sultanate of Zanzibar and grew up there and in India until his mid-teens, before moving with his family to Middlesex, England - ultimately forming the band Queen in 1970 with Brian May and Roger Taylor. Mercury died in 1991 at age 45 from complications from AIDS, having acknowledged the day before his death that he'd contracted the disease.

Lin Manuel Miranda

Lin-Manuel Miranda is an American composer, lyricist, playwright, and actor best known for creating and starring in the Broadway musicals Hamilton and In the Heights. He co-wrote the songs for Disney's Moana soundtrack (2016) and is set to star in their upcoming film Mary Poppins Returns. Miranda's awards include a Pulitzer Prize, two Grammy Awards, an Emmy Award, a MacArthur Fellowship, and three Tony Awards.

Miranda also wrote the book, music and lyrics for another Broadway musical, Hamilton. The show earned the 2016 Pulitzer Prize for Drama, the 2016 Grammy Award for Best Musical Theater Album, and was nominated for a record-setting 16 Tony Awards, of which it won 11, including Best Musical, Best Original Score and Best Book. For his performance in the lead role of Alexander Hamilton, Miranda was nominated for another Tony Award for Best Actor in a Musical.

Randy Newman

Randy Newman's pop songs of the 1970s earned him a reputation as a songwriter's songwriter, but he's famous to most audiences for his songs and scores for popular movies such as Toy Story (1995), Bug's Life (1998) and Monsters, Inc. (2001). Randy Newman began writing songs at an early age, and in 1968 released his first album, Randy Newman Creates Something New Under the Sun. During the 1970s he released several albums that received critical praise and won over loyal fans, even if they didn't make Newman into rock star celebrity. He had a top 40 hit with "Sail Away" (1972), but it was his 1977 song "Short People," a controversial parody about bigotry, that became his biggest hit. Since the 1980s he has concentrated on writing film scores, including Ragtime (1981), The Natural (1984, starring Robert Redford), James and the Giant Peach (1996) and the sequels Toy Story 2 (1999) and Toy Story 3 (2010).

Dolly Parton

Dolly Rebecca Parton is an American singer-songwriter, actress, author, businesswoman, and humanitarian, known primarily for her work in country music.

Parton is the most honored female country performer of all time. Achieving 25 RIAA certified gold, platinum, and multi-platinum awards, she has had 25 songs reach No. 1 on the Billboard Country charts, a record for a female artist. She has 41 career top 10 country albums, a record for any artist, and she has 110 career charted singles over the past 40 years. All-inclusive sales of singles, albums, hits collections, and digital downloads during her career have topped 100 million worldwide. She has garnered eight Grammy Awards, two Academy Award nominations, ten Country Music Association Awards, seven Academy of Country Music Awards, three American Music Awards, and is one of only seven female artists to win the Country Music Association's Entertainer of the Year Award. Parton has received 46 Grammy nominations, tying her with Bruce Springsteen for the most Grammy nominations and placing her in tenth place overall.