Barry Mann (born Barry Imberman; February 9, 1939) is an American songwriter and musician, and was part of a successful songwriting partnership with his wife, Cynthia Weil.
He has written or co-written 53 hits in the UK and 98 in the US.[1]
Early life
Mann was born "Barry Imberman"[2] on February 9, 1939,[3] to a Jewish family[4] in Brooklyn, New York City, United States.[5] He was born two days before fellow songwriter Gerry Goffin.
Career
His first successful song as a writer was "She Say (Oom Dooby Doom)", a Top 20 chart-scoring song composed for the band The Diamonds in 1959. Mann co-wrote the song with Mike Anthony (Michael Logiudice). In 1961, Mann had his greatest success to that point with "I Love How You Love Me", written with Larry Kolber and a No. 5 scoring single for the band The Paris Sisters (seven years later, Bobby Vinton's version would reach the Top 10). The same year, Mann himself reached the Top 40 as a performer with a novelty song co-written with Gerry Goffin, "Who Put the Bomp",[5] which parodied the nonsense words of the then-popular doo-wop genre.[3][6]
Despite his success as a singer, Mann chose to channel his creativity into songwriting, forming a prolific partnership with Weil,[5] a lyricist he met while both were staff songwriters at Don Kirshner and Al Nevin's company Aldon Music, whose offices were located in Manhattan, near the composing-and-publishing factory the Brill Building. Mann and Weil, who married in 1961,[5] developed some songs intended to be socially conscious, with successes such as "Uptown" by The Crystals, "We Gotta Get out of This Place" by the Animals, "Magic Town" by The Vogues, and "Kicks" by Paul Revere & the Raiders.[5] Mann and Weil were disturbed when "Only In America", a song they had written with the team of Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller and conceived originally for and recorded by the Drifters as a protest against racial prejudice, was re-worked by Leiber and Stoller into an uncontroversial success for Jay & The Americans.
As of May 2009[update], Mann's song catalog lists 635 songs.[7] He has received 56 popular music, country, and Rhythm & Blues awards from Broadcast Music Inc., and 46 Millionaire Awards for radio performances numbering more than one million plays.[8] The song "You've Lost That Lovin' Feelin'", co-written with Weil and Phil Spector,[5] was the most played song of the 20th century, with more than 14 million plays.
In 1987, Mann and Weil were inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame.[3] In 2011, they received the Johnny Mercer Award, the greatest honor from the Songwriters Hall of Fame.[9]
