David, Hal

David, Hal , American lyricist; b. N.Y., May 25, 1921. David wrote literate, romantic lyrics, primarily to the complex melodies of Burt Bacharach, that made him one of the most successful lyricists of the 1960s and resulted in such hits as “This Guy’s in Love with You,” “Raindrops Keep Fallin’ on My Head,” “(They Long to Be) Close to You,” and a string of popular songs written for Dionne Warwick. Though primarily a creator of independent songs, David also wrote the lyrics for one long-running Broadway musical, Promises, Promises, and for songs used in at least 32 motion pictures between 1952–80.

David was the son of Gedalier David, who ran a delicatessen, and Lina Goldberg David. His older brother Mack David was also a successful lyricist. He studied violin as a child and played in local bands, but he was also interested in writing, and after graduating from high school he enrolled in the School of Journalism at N.Y.U. Dropping out after his sophomore year, he worked as a copywriter for the New York Post then went into the armed forces when the U.S. entered WW II. He served in the Special Services division, where he wrote songs and sketches, gaining enough recognition to be admitted into ASCAP in 1943. He returned to N.Y. after the war to pursue songwriting. On Dec. 24, 1947, he married Anne Rauchman, a schoolteacher, with whom he would have two children.

David enjoyed his first song success with “The Four Winds and the Seven Seas” (music by Don Rodney), which peaked in the Top Ten for Sammy Kaye in September 1949. His second came with “American Beauty Rose” (music and lyrics by David, Redd Evans, and Arthur Altman), a chart entry for Eddy Howard in July 1950. “Wonderful, Wasn’t It?” (music by Don Rodney) was performed by Frankie Laine in the film Rainbow ‘Round My Shoulder, released in August 1952, and Laine’s recording turned up in the charts in September. Teresa Brewer had a chart entry in February 1954 with David́s “Bell Bottom Blues” (music by Leon Carr).

David met Burt Bacharach in 1957 and they began to collaborate, first placing the song “Warm and Tender” in the film Lizzie (April 1957), where it was sung by Johnny Mathis, who also recorded it. Marty Robbins then recorded their song “The Story of My Life,” which reached the pop Top 40 in November 1957 and hit #1 in the country charts in January 1958. Perry Como cut

˝Magic Moments,” which entered the pop Top Ten in January 1958. (In the U.K., Michael Holliday’s version of “The Story of My Life” hit #1 in February, followed by Perry Como’s “Magic Moments.˝) Notwithstanding these successes, Bacharach accepted an offer from Marlene Dietrich to become her musical director, and he toured with her for the next several years. Back in N.Y., he collaborated with various lyricists, including David, who also worked with other composers.

David scored his next hit with Lee Pockriss; the two wrote “My Heart Is an Open Book,” which hit the Top Ten for Carl Dobkins Jr. in July 1959. That month, “Broken-Hearted Melody” (music by Sherman Edwards) hit the charts for Sarah Vaughan. It reached the Top Ten in August and became David’s first million-seller. Also in August, “With Open Arms,” a collaboration with Bacharach, reached the Top 40 for Jane Morgan.

David worked steadily during the late 1950s and early 1960s, often writing English lyrics to popular foreign songs and title or “exploitation” (i.e., promotional) songs for motion pictures. His next notable success came with “Sea of Heartbreak” (music by Paul Hampton), a Top 40 pop hit and Top Ten country hit for Don Gibson in July 1961. By 1962, Bacharach was spending more time in N.Y., and he and David began to collaborate more frequently. Their exploitation song “(The Man Who Shot) Liberty Valance,” promoting but not actually heard in the film of the same name, became a Top Ten hit for Gene Pitney in June 1962. That same month, David’s “Johnny Get Angry” (music by Sherman Edwards) reached the Top 40 for Joanie Sommers, but this was his last hit without Bacharach for more than a decade. Bacharach and David returned to the Top 40 in August with Jerry Butler’s recording of “Make It Easy on Yourself” and in October with Gene Pitney’s “Only Love Can Break a Heart,” which also topped the easy-listening chart.

Bacharach and David discovered Dionne Warwick as a backup singer at a recording session and used her as a demo singer on their songs, then arranged to have her signed to Scepter Records and became her producers. Their first record together was “Don’t Make Me Over,” which reached the Top 40 in December 1962. The songwriters” string of hits continued in 1963: Bobby Vinton’s recording of “Blue on Blue” reached the Top Ten in June; and Gene Pitney scored a Top 40 hit with “True Love Never Runs Smooth” in August and another with “Twenty Four Hours from Tulsa” in November. That same month, Bacharach and David scored a second Top 40 hit with “Wives and Lovers,” an exploitation song recorded by Jack Jones that earned them a Grammy nomination for Song of the Year.

Warwick scored her first Top Ten hit with a Bacharach-David song in February 1964 with “Anyone Who Had a Heart.” Cilia Black bested her that same month in the U.K., going all the way to #1 with the song. Warwick followed up with a second Top Ten hit in the team’s “Walk on By” in May. By this point Bacharach and David were so prolific that artists began to score hits with songs the songwriters failed to have hits with earlier, or that had been placed on the B-sides of successful records. Dusty Springfield reached the Top Ten in July 1964 with “Wishin” and Hopin˝,” a song that had appeared on the B-side of a single by Warwick the year before. That same month, Springfield hit the Top Ten in the U.K. with “I Just Don’t Know What to Do with Myself,” which did not become an American hit until later. Warwick returned to the Top 40 in September with “You’ll Never Get to Heaven (If You Break My Heart)” and in November with Bacharach and David’s 1963 song “Reach Out for Me.” Meanwhile, “(There’s) Always Something There to Remind Me” missed the American Top 40 but hit #1 for Sandie Shaw in the U.K. in October. Similarly, Billy J. Kramer and the Dakotas’ rendition of “Trains and Boats and Planes” made the British Top 40 in May 1965, but did not climb as high in the U.S.

Bacharach and David wrote and produced “What the World Needs Now Is Love” for Jackie DeShannon, and the record hit the Top Ten in July 1965. They wrote the songs for the comic film What’s New Pussycat? featuring Peter Sellers and released in June, among them the Oscar-nominated title song, a Top Ten hit for Tom Jones in July. The film was one of the year’s biggest hits, and the soundtrack album spent five months in the charts. The Walker Brothers revived “Make It Easy on Yourself,” topping the U.K. charts in September and reaching the U.S. Top 40 in November. Warwick’s recording of “Are You There (With Another Girl)” entered the charts in December, reaching the Top 40 in January 1966.

Bacharach and David devoted much of 1966 to writing music for films and television. Their title song for the motion picture Alfie was first heard in a version by Cilia Black that hit the U.K. Top Ten in April, then was sung on the soundtrack by Cher when the film opened in August; her recording reached the U.S. Top40. Bacharach and David scored an original TV musical, On the Flip Side, starring Rick Nelson, that was broad-cast in December, as well as another Peter Sellers movie, After the Fox, released the same month. Meanwhile, their catalog was mined for hits, especially by Warwick, in recordings produced by the songwriters themselves. She altered the 1964 song “Kentucky Bluebird (Send a Message to Martha)” to “Message to Michael” and took it into the Top Ten in May, revived “Trains and Boats and Planes” for a Top 40 hit in July, and put “I Just Don’t Know What to Do with Myself” into the American Top 40 for the first time in October. In June, a year after the release of What’s New Pussycat?, the rock band Love made a Top 40 hit out of “My Little Red Book,” a song from the movie’s score.

˝Alfie” was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Song in early 1968, which may have prompted Warwick to record a new version produced by Bacharach and David. She sang it at the Oscar ceremony, and her rendition reached the Top 40. The songwriters did their third score for a Peter Sellers film comedy, the James Bond spoof Casino Royale, released in April. The title tune was performed by Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass as an instrumental on the soundtrack and became a Top 40 hit, earning Bacharach and David a Grammy nomination for Best Instrumental Theme. “The Look of

Love” was sung on the soundtrack by Dusty Springfield and also became a Top 40 hit. The film was one of the year’s biggest box office successes, and the soundtrack album spent five months in the charts, earning a Grammy nomination for Best Original Score Written for a Motion Picture or TV Show.

Their film work completed, Bacharach and David again had time to write and produce for Warwick. She took their socially conscious song “The Windows of the World” into the Top 40 in August, then scored her biggest hit ever with a Bacharach-David song, hitting the Top Ten with the gold-selling “I Say a Little Prayer” in November. She followed it with “Do You Know the Way to San Jose,” which hit the Top Ten in May 1968.

As with “Alfie” the year before, the Academy Award nomination for “The Look of Love” in early 1969 may have inspired Sergio Mendes and Brasil “66 to revive the song with a version that bested Dusty Springfield’s original in the charts, reaching the Top Ten in 1968. Meanwhile, Herb Alpert debuted as a singer, recording Bacharach and David’s “This Guy’s in Love with You” for a million-selling #1 hit the same month. The song-writers also provided a follow-up, their 1964 song “To Wait for Love,” which Alpert took into the Top 40 in September. Warwick returned to the Top 40 with the songwriters” “Who Is Gonna Love Me?” in September, and “I Say a Little Prayer” became a million-selling Top Ten hit for the second time within a year in October as a recording by Aretha Franklin.

Bacharach and David spent the better part of 1968 writing songs for the Broadway musical Promises, Promises, playwright Neil Simon’s stage adaptation of the film The Apartment. Warwick provided a preview of the show in a recording of the title song that reached the Top 40 in November. When Promises, Promises opened the following month, it became an enormous hit, running 1,281 performances, winning the Tony Award for Best Musical, and spawning a cast album that spent three months in the charts and won the Grammy for Best Score from an Original Cast Show Album.

Warwick again achieved a quick revival with a Bacharach-David song, altering the title of their earlier hit to “This Girl’s in Love with You” and returning it to the Top Ten in March 1969. She followed with the songwriters” title song for the motion picture The April Fools, reaching the Top 40 in June. Tom Jones hit #1 on the easy-listening charts in September with “I’ll Never Fall in Love Again,” a song drawn from the score of the still-running Promises, Promises. The song went on to become a standard: Bobbie Gentry topped the U.K. charts with it in October; Warwick returned it to #1 on the easy-listening charts and took it into the pop Top Ten in early 1970; it was also nominated for a Grammy for Song of the Year.

Also in September 1969, Bacharach and David enjoyed a Top 40 hit with Engelbert Humperdinck’s recording of “I’m a Better Man,” and in October. Isaac Hayes took a revival of “Walk on By” into the Top 40. The duo’s major effort for the fall was the music for the Western film Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. It became the biggest box office hit of 1969 with a gold-selling soundtrack album that spent more than a year in the charts, featuring the #1 million-selling single “Raindrops Keep Fallin” on My Head,” sung by B. J. Thomas in a recording produced by Bacharach and David. The song won the Academy Award for Best Song and earned Grammy nominations for Song of the Year and Best Contemporary Song.

As the Bacharach-David songwriting partnership reached a peak of success in late 1969, however, David engaged in his most prominent work outside the team since the early 1960s, collaborating with John Barry on the songs used in the James Bond film On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, released in December, and one of the year’s biggest box office successes, with a soundtrack album that spent three months in the charts.

By now, Bacharach had established a career as a recording artist and performer that was taking up much of his time. Nevertheless, in 1970 the two collaborated on a follow-up to “Raindrops Keep Fallin” on My Head” for B. J. Thomas, who took their “Everybody’s Out of Town” into the Top 40 in April, and they continued to produce new material for Warwick, who enjoyed Top 40 hits with “Let Me Go to Him” in May and “Paper Mache” in August. Most of the team’s hits during the year, however, came with revivals of earlier songs. R. B. Greaves reached the Top 40 in February with “(There’s) Always Something There to Remind Me.” In July, the Carpenters hit #1 with the gold-selling “(They Long to Be) Close to You,” a 1963 song that had been recorded unsuccessfully several times before. Warwick reached the Top 40 with a revival of “Make It Easy on Yourself” in October. And the 5th Dimension took a 1967 Bacharach-David song, “One Less Bell to Answer,” into the Top Ten in December. The record sold a million copies and topped the easy-listening charts in January 1971.

Bacharach and David were not heard from much in 1971 and 1972 while they worked on a film musical adaptation of the James Hilton novel Lost Horizon. Still, they continued to write songs for Warwick and Thomas that became minor chart entries. The most notable revival of one of their songs during this period was Tom Clay’s medley of “What the World Needs Now Is Love” and “Abraham, Martin and John” (music and lyrics by Dick Holler), which hit the Top Ten in July 1971. The first hearing of music from Lost Horizon came in December 1972 with the release of “Living Together, Growing Together,” a song from the score recorded by the 5th Dimension. It reached the Top 40 in February 1973. The original motion picture soundtrack, released in January, spent more than four months in the charts. But the film, which opened in March, was a failure, leading to the breakup of the Bacharach-David partnership.

The Stylistics revived “You’ll Never Get to Heaven (If You Break My Heart),” reaching the Top 40 in June 1973. David had songs in two films released that spring. Marty Robbins sang “A Man and a Train” (music by Frank DeVol) in Emperor of the North Pole, released in May, and his recording made the country charts in June. Anne Murray sang “Send a Little Love My Way” (music by Henry Mancini) in Oklahoma Crude, released in June, and her recording made both the pop and country charts in August. Teaming with Michel Legrand, David

wrote songs for the stage musical Brainchild, which opened a try out in Philadelphia on March 25, 1974, but closed on April 16 without going to Broadway. Lena Home recorded three of the show’s songs with the composer for her 1975 album Lena and Michel David joined the board of directors of ASCAP in 1974, a position he continued to hold 25 years later; he served as the organization’s president from 1980–86.

In April 1975, Albert Hammond reached the charts with “99 Miles from L.A.” (music by Albert Hammond, lyrics by David); the song topped the easy-listening charts in May. That month, “The Greatest Gift” (music by Henry Mancini, lyrics by David) was featured in the Peter Sellers film The Return of the Pink Panther. Warwick sued Bacharach and David in the fall of 1975 for failing to write and produce an album for her; they in turn sued each other. The suits were settled out of court in 1979. David collaborated with Archie Jordan in 1977 for “It Was Almost Like a Song˝; Ronnie Milsap’s recording topped the country charts in July and crossed over to the pop charts, reaching the Top 40 in August. It was nominated for a Grammy for Best Country Song.

David again collaborated with John Barry for the title song of the James Bond film Moonraker, released in June 1979. Naked Eyes revived “(There’s) Always Some-thing There to Remind Me” for a Top Ten hit in June 1983. Julio Iglesias and Willie Nelson’s recording of “To All the Girls I’ve Loved Before” (music by Albert Hammond, lyrics by David) reached the Top Ten of the pop charts in April 1984 and topped the country charts in May, selling a million copies. Sybil revived “Don’t Make Me Over” for a million-selling Top 40 hit in November 1989.

David reunited with Bacharach in 1992 and wrote “Sunny Weather Lover,” which Warwick recorded for her album Friends Can Be Lovers. Back to Bacharach and David featuring the team’s songs opened Off- Broadway on March 25, 1993, and ran 69 performances. The songwriters again teamed to write a new song, “You’ve Got It All Wrong,” for inclusion in a showcase performance of Promises, Promises in N.Y. in the spring of 1997. Bacharach-David songs were prominently featured in the 1997 films Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery, released in May, and My Best Friend’s Wedding, released in June. The latter had a gold- selling soundtrack album.

David continued to write lyrics in the late 1990s, notably working with Charles Strouse on a stage musical called Times Square and again teaming with Bacharach on songs for the film Isn’t She Great? starring Bette Midler.

Works

(only works for which David was a primary, credited lyricist are listed):FILMS: What’s New Pussycat? (1965); After the Fox (1966); Casino Royale (1967); Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969); On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1969); Lost Horizon (1973).MUSICALS/REVUES : Promises, Promises (Dec. 1, 1968).TELEVISION: On the Flip Side (Dec. 7, 1966).

—William Ruhlmann