Alan Bergman, Oscar-winning songwriter behind ‘The Means We Have been,’ dies at 99

Alan Bergman, the award-winning songwriter and lyricist who teamed along with his spouse Marilyn Bergman to provide a few of tv and movie's most memorable music, has died. He was 99.

Bergman died on Thursday at his residence in Los Angeles with daughter Julie Bergman by his aspect, household spokesperson Ken Sunshine confirmed to Leisure Weekly.

"Bergman suffered from respiratory points in latest months, however continued to write down songs until the very finish," Sunshine's assertion learn.

Though some might have by no means heard of Bergman earlier than, they've undoubtedly heard his work. The Bergmans are thought-about two of essentially the most influential lyricists of twentieth century American music, notably in movie and TV.

The husband-and-wife duo wrote lyrics for stars like Ray Charles, Frank Sinatra, Tony Bennett, and Barbra Streisand, who turned a frequent collaborator. In 2011, Streisand launched an album titled What Issues Most: Barbra Streisand Sings the Lyrics of Alan and Marilyn Bergman.

The couple wrote the lyrics for among the most iconic TV present theme songs in American media, together with Alice, sung by sitcom lead Linda Lavin, and three of Norman Lear's Seventies sitcoms, together with Maude and Good Occasions.

Their music has been featured in such movies as Yentl, Tootsie, and Sabrina, scoring them a myriad of award nominations and wins.Between 1970 and 1996, the Bergmans acquired a complete of 16 Oscar nominations, profitable three. They took residence two for Greatest Authentic Music for "The Windmills of Your Thoughts" in 1969 with French composer Michel Legrand from The Thomas Crown Affair and for "The Means We Have been" in 1974 from the film of the identical identify starring Streisand and Robert Redford. Their third victory got here within the defunct class of Greatest Authentic Music Rating for Streisand's Yentl in 1984, once more with Legrand.

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The Bergmans have additionally received three Grammy Awards, together with Music of the Yr for "The Means We Have been," and 4 Emmy Awards.

In a stroke of destiny, Bergman was born on Sept. 11, 1925, in the identical Brooklyn hospital the place his spouse was born three years later.

A musician by nature, he started piano classes when he was 6 and began writing songs as a boy. He studied music and theater arts on the College of North Carolina at Chapel Hill earlier than his research have been interrupted when he was drafted by the Military in 1943.

Bergman accomplished faculty at Chapel Hill below the G.I. Invoice in 1948 and earned a grasp’s diploma in music from the College of California, Los Angeles a yr later. He started moonlighting as a tv director in Philadelphia and dealing as a lyricist with the songwriter Lew Spence in Los Angeles — which is the place he met Marilyn Keith, who was additionally working with Spence as a lyricist.

The couple wed in 1958 and welcomed their daughter Julie in 1960. They wrote youngsters's songs early of their partnership; their first chart success got here within the type of the Haitian tune "Choucoune" which their translated into English because the "Yellow Chook."

Amongst their many accolades, the Bergmans acquired a Trustee Award in 2013 and have been inducted into the Songwriters Corridor of Fame in 1979.

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Bergman saved writing after Marilyn died in 2022. In an August 2022 interview with Classical Voice, the songwriter famous that whereas the method isn't the identical in her absence, "the concepts are nonetheless coming.”

Bergman is survived by his daughter Julie, a author and movie producer, and granddaughter Emily Sender. There will probably be a non-public graveside burial.

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