Marilyn Bergman, the songwriting giant and tunes marketplace fixture who, with her partner Alan, wrote the lyrics to Oscar-winning tracks like Barbra Streisand’s “The Way We Were” and Michel Legrand’s “The Windmills of Your Intellect,” has died at the age of 93.
Bergman’s representative Ken Sunshine verified Marilyn’s dying from non-Covid-linked respiratory failure to the Hollywood Reporter Saturday. She is survived by her partner and collaborator Alan, who is 96.
“It is with deep disappointment that I individually, and all of ASCAP, mourn the passing of Marilyn Bergman, one particular of the biggest lyricists who ever lived and definitely ASCAP royalty,” Paul Williams, fellow Oscar-profitable songwriter and present ASCAP president and chairman, reported in a statement Saturday. “She was a amazing songwriter who jointly with her husband gave us some of the most wonderful and enduring lyrics of all time. She was a tireless and intense advocate for new music creators not only all through her time period as president and chairman of ASCAP but all over her daily life. Our group will skip her intelligence, her wit and her wisdom. Alan — we mourn with you.”
The duo — inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame and recipients of the Nationwide Academy of Songwriters’ lifetime accomplishment award — won 3 Oscars and two Grammys in excess of their 6-decade-long profession, most notably for “The Way We Had been,” which received both equally Music of the Calendar year and Best Unique Song at the 1973 Grammys and Academy Awards, respectively. In 2011, Streisand launched an album of the Bergmans’ tracks, What Issues Most.
https://www.youtube.com/enjoy?v=ifWOSnoCS0M
With French composer Michael Legrand, the Bergmans co-wrote lyrics for “The Windmills of Your Mind” (1st recorded by Noel Harrison for the 1969 film The Thomas Crown Affair right before Dusty Springfield manufactured it a strike afterwards that 12 months), as perfectly as “Pieces of Desires,” “What Are You Carrying out the Relaxation of Your Existence?” (also on Streisand’s The Way We Had been) and “How Do You Keep the Music Participating in?,” which crooner Tony Bennett himself coated and referred to as his “favorite song” subsequent news of Bergman’s death Saturday:
Marilyn and Alan Bergman with Michele Legrand wrote my favourite music, “How Do You Continue to keep The New music Actively playing? We dropped Marilyn these days, but her songs keeps actively playing.https://t.co/iM1fITp9zz
— Tony Bennett (@itstonybennett) January 8, 2022
Quincy Jones also collaborated with the duo on the new music from In the Heat of the Night time Marilyn’s loss of life came just 1 working day following the death of that film’s star Sidney Poitier. “My dear, expensive, beautiful Marilyn Bergman, to lose you this early morning, so shut to our brother Sidney is just crushing me. You, along with your beloved Alan, were being the epitome of Nadia Boulanger’s perception that ‘an artist can never be additional or a lot less than they are as a human becoming,’” Jones tweeted Saturday.
“The solution weapon to your songwriting…the unconditional really like in your coronary heart for your household, friends, and community. Your lyrics an extension of your getting. We shared so a lot of everyday living together…songs, laughter, really like and hugs, and each minute was pure joy. And when they talk to ‘How Do You Keep The New music Playing,’ I will always say inquire Marilyn and Alan Bergman to write you the tune. RIP my sweet ‘Owl.’ Your tracks will sing in our hearts permanently.”
The Bergmans were being nominated for the Music of the 12 months Grammy four periods — most recently in 1979 for Neil Diamond’s “You Really do not Provide Me Flowers” — and been given the Trustees Award from the Recording Academy in 2013.
In addition to her lyrics, Marilyn Bergman was a music business heavyweight who served as the chairman and president of the American Modern society of Composers, Songwriters, and Performers (ASCAP) from 1994 to 2009.
Norman Lear tweeted Saturday, “There was only a person Marilyn Bergman. No just one realized that much more than her spouse and partner in songs, Alan. To those people of us who beloved the Bergman’s lyrics, Marilyn normally takes a bit of our hearts and souls with her these days.”
