One of the greatest songwriting teams of New York's legendary Brill Building era will be honored by the Songwriters Hall of Fame (SHOF) when Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil receive the prestigious Johnny Mercer Award at the 42nd Annual Induction and Awards Dinner, June 16, at New York's Marriott Marquis Hotel.
Mann and Weil are known for penning such hits as the Righteous Brothers' “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feelin'” (with Phil Spector) and "Soul And Inspiration," The Drifters' “On Broadway” (with Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller), The Ronettes' “Walking In The Rain,” Paul Revere & The Raiders' “Kicks," The Animals' “We Gotta Get Out Of This Place,” B.J. Thomas's “I Just Can’t Help Believing,” Dolly Parton's “Here You Come Again,” Sérgio Mendes's “Never Gonna Let You Go,” James Ingram's “Just Once,” and the Linda Ronstadt/Aaron Neville duet “Don’t Know Much” (with Tom Snow), to name just a few.
The husband-and-wife team are among the most successful songwriting partnerships ever. Their catalog has been called "a soundtrack to our lives," as it extends from the the so-called Brill Building era of 1960s pop songwriting centered in Midtown Manhattan (and also including the likes of Carole King, Gerry Goffin, Neil Sedaka, Jeff Barry, Ellie Greenwich, Spector, Lieber and Stoller) up through today.
Together Mann and Weil have won 112 pop, country and R&B awards from Broadcast Music Inc. (recognizing highest performance popularity on American radio and television in a particular year) and 115 Millionaire Awards, signifying radio performances of a million or more plays. “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feelin'” received 14 pop awards and has been honored as the most performed song in the BMI catalogue and the most performed song of the 20th Century, garnering over 14 million performances.
The couple's achievements also include the first Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Academy of Songwriters, The Clooney Foundation’s Award for Legendary Song Composition, BMI’s Robert Burton Award for the most performed country song of 1977 (“Here You Come Again”) and the 2003 Heroes Award from the New York Chapter of the Recording Academy. They were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame last year.
"Barry and Cynthia’s massive stream of classic songs have changed the face of popular music in a way that has endured, with songs that have a straight-from-the-heart, deep appeal,” said SHOF chairman and fellow Mercer Award recipient Jimmy Webb. “The Songwriters Hall of Fame is proud to bestow our prestigious Johnny Mercer Award upon this groundbreaking team.”
The Johnny Mercer Award, the highest honor bestowed by the Songwriters Hall of Fame, is exclusively reserved for a songwriter who has already been inducted in a prior year, and whose body of work is of such high quality and impact, that it upholds the gold standard set by Johnny Mercer.
Past Mercer Award recipients have included Phil Collins, Holland-Dozier-Holland, Paul Anka, Dolly Parton, Kris Kristofferson, Smokey Robinson, Stevie Wonder, Carole King, Billy Joel, Hal David, Burt Bacharach, Jerry Leiber, Mike Stoller, Paul Simon, Alan and Marilyn Bergman, Stephen Sondheim, Cy Coleman, Sammy Cahn and Jule Styne.
This year's SHOF inductees were announced previously and include John Bettis, Garth Brooks, Leon Russell, Billy Steinberg & Tom Kelly and Allen Toussaint.
The SHOF was established in 1969 to honor the creators of the most beloved songs from the world’s popular music songbook, and also develops new songwriting talent through workshops, showcases and scholarships.
[The Examiner contributes to the SHOF newsletter.]
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