JPF Home Page Forums General Messages General Message Forum Best Songwriters Of the 20th And 21st Centuries

What's silly Big Jim? If it's such a silly question (a simple question at that), then why did you participate?

I'm asking for opinions from people who know about songwriters and who they are, rather than having to pick my own brain to come up with examples for my project. It saves time and research to have the names in front of me. The list so far is long. I'll only use a few examples in the end. I know a good number of names mentioned and would have never thought of others without every one's help.

So leave it up to Big Jim to call something silly when he doesn't have a clue of the reason.

Yo Ben, I'll give you your thread back in a minute, but Kanye West is the best songwriter of all time.

If he insists. Thanks Mark.

Could go on forever but here are a few people who really make me realize how small I am. These people have more great songs on just ONE record than other great hit songwriters have in a lifetime.
I'll vere away from the showtune song writers.

Stevie Wonder
Holland Dozier Holland
Billy Joel
Taupin/John
Barry Gibb
Carol King
Paul Simon
Pete Townshend
Bob Dylan
Bruce Springsteen
Jagger/Richards
Brian Wilson

Here is a perfect example of what I mean.

The Stranger 1977

1. Movin Out
2. The Stranger
3. Just The Way You Are
4. Scenes From An Italian Restaurant
5. Vienna
6. Only The Good Die Young
7. She's Always A Woman
8. Get It Right The First Time
9. Everybody Has A Dream

This is one album not a greatest hits. Write one of these and your a great songwriter write two and you make this list. Make this album and your in the Hall Of Fame.

Just a few more personal ones

Creed/Bell
Gamble/Huff
Hank Williams
Ian Anderson
Paul Williams
Joni Mitchell
Waters/Gilmore
Mercury/May
Don Mclean
Cat Stevens
James Taylor
Ashford/Simpson

Thanks folks, most of the responses were favorite songwriters. It's impossible to call some "The Best", but that's what my question was all about. You can't truely call someone "the best". Here's what I'm using so far. I may have to narrow it down further. Genre doesn't matter. A song writer is a song writer. I'm looking at 109 years of songwriting.

This is based on longevity and number of hit songs written. This list isn't in any particular order.

Dylan
Paul Simon
Lennon & MCcartney
Cole Porter
Bacharach & David
Irving Berlin
Hoagy Carmichael
Gordon Lightfoot
Harlan Howard
Johnny Mercer
George Gershwin/ Oscar Levant (not mentioned)
Leiber & Stoller
Jimmy Webb
Guy Clark
Rodgers & Hammerstein
Rogers & Hart (not mentioned)
John Phillip Sousa (not mentioned)

I didn't know you meant famous or "hit" songwriters or I would also have gone with Gordon Lightfoot.

Most people have never heard of Michael Peter Smith, but he is, in my opinion, the best.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Peter_Smith

Mike, I checked out Michael Peter Smith earlier. And you are right. Didn't know about him, but I'm a big Steve Goodman and Prine fan. Those Chicago boys.

ALSO, LEADBELLY,MUDDY WATERS, PETE SEEGER, WOODY GUTHRIE,
LONG LIVE THE BLUES,FOLK,COUNTRY

Neil Finn.

cheers, niteshift

My point is simple. I do not need to know any reason for you asking the question when the questions itself is silly. The best cannot be judged......What benchmarks are the best judged on? Is there a scientific test that can prove who is best? Who sold most records or had the biggest influence may not be the best just the most popular.
Our opinions are only that opinions.....One man's best is usually anothers worst. I like sweetcorn it is the best vegetable IMO but my wife hates it and would never eat it. Whilst we all have favourites no one can say that any composer is best. Taste, culture and experience cannot be quantified. There have been so many composers in so many different styles and genres we cannot possibly have heard a tiny percentage of what is and was composed. That alone is enough to say that choosing a best is nonsense.

Maybe that was the point you were making and this exercise is a round about way of proving that when it comes to music there are no bests only favourites.

Perhaps you should have said favourite instead of best.

The research could also have been done here http://www.songwritershalloffame.org/exhibits/era



Johnny Mercer founded Songwriters Hall of Fame to put the spotlight on who actually makes the songs in our popular culture.

So looking for "the" best can at best give an arbitrary answer, as there certainly are many who can qualify. But if the best is extended to a larger group, selected with some informed criteria, there can be room for many.

Oh boy, now it's debate time!!...While I love Gordon Lightfoot, he's only had, what, 3 real "hits"...I also noticed a lack of women...So I'd have to consider dropping Gordon in favor or either Dianne Warren or Carol King...I won't list their songs here, but put their catalogs along side of Lightfoot's & it's a no brainer.

I might mildly debate a few others, but Ms's King & Warren are the only two I'd kidnap your cookies and hold 'em ransom for.

Midnite

P.S...Just caught yer shout out...Godspeed Buck!

Fine Big Jim. I should have said favorite, but being called "silly" was a little bit insulting since you didn't know the reason for my question. Remind me not to ask you for advice for fear of being degraded in front of my friends for asking a stupid question.

"My point is simple. I do not need to know any reason for you asking the question when the questions itself is silly."

I don't remember calling out "Big Jim" and asking a question. Big Jim took it upon himself to come in and insult and degrade my thread. If it's so far below your pay grade than please stay away.

I'm not looking for the "Best" songwriter of all time. I'm compiling a list of great songwriters from 1900-2009.

Thanks Midnite, Buck and his father did a lot for music and racial harmony down here. They owned the first integrated music and dance hall during Jim Crow.

BODY OF WORKS and hits

should be considered

A few hits against a lifetime of evolution....... I mean - some have just a few while others continue to evolve and create

john prine

Isn't that 2 more than Dylan had, Midnite?

Scott

Early Morning Rain
Care Free Highway
Rainy Day People
If You Could Read My Mind
Wreck Of The Edmund Fitzgerald
Sundown

Those are only some of the songs that Lightfoot made hits himself. It doesn't include others who recorded his songs. Google Tony Rice.

Be careful Scott, I know where you live

Oh dear Ben, whatever are they putting in the water down there?

I truly love & respect Mr. Lightfoot. Honestly & deeply...But can you imagine anything of his being covered by Motown? The Beatles? The Monkees, Herman's Hermits(okay, strike that last one)...& yeah, props also to Gerry Goffin.

Chains...Beatles
Don't bring me down...The Animals
Go away little girl...Gary Puckett
Hey girl...Freddie Scott
Hi di ho..Blood sweat and tears
I feel the earth move...
I'm into something good...Herman's Hermits
It's going to take some time this time...The Carpenters
It's too late...Ms. King herself
Jazzman...Lisa Simpson
The Loco-motion..Little Eva & Grand Funk
Natural woman...Aretha etc.
One fine day...The Chiffons?
Pleasant Valley Sunday...The Monkees, and a terrific example of bad prosody in a song
The reason...Celine dion
So far away...Ms. King
Some kind of wonderful...Motown
Take good care of my baby...someone sappy
Up on the roof...
You've got a friend...
Will you still love me tomorrow...

And I dare anyone, who read just the titles, to tell me that the melodies didn't automatically pop into their heads...

Midnite

Jim Croce
Willie Nelson
The Fogerty boys
Loretta Lynn/How did we forget her?
Way too many more to mention

Hey Midnite Bob,

I know you aren't directing this at me, but it sounding like a fun and imaginative way to spend a few minutes.

The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald -- The Beatles (in the style of "Norwegian Wood")

Sundown -- The Beatles (In the style of "Get Back")

If You Could Read My Mind -- Smokey Robinson (In the style of "Tracks of My Tears")

Rainy Day People -- The Monkees (in the style of "Daydream Believer")

Carefree Highway -- Edwin Starr (in the style of "War)
...lol...just kidding...seriously, why not Diana Ross (In the Style of "Sweetest Hangover")

At any rate, I dare you, now, NOT to think of a scruffy Paul, on a rooftop, belting out "Sundown"...I mean...isn't that on "Let It Be" ... ?!?

BTW "Early Morning Rain" was not mentioned, but has been widely covered, including one by Paul Weller, formerly of "the Jam" and "the Style Council" ...and by "Peter, Paul, and Mary" to name a couple.

Cheers,
Mike

Michael,

I seem unable to come up with a response to this, but then again, it's early in the day yet, and I usually wait until at least noon before I dip into the pharmaseuticals...:-)

I dunno...Why don't we toss in The Who blending "Cobwebs and Dust" with "Boris the Spider"?

Midnite

What else is there besides the 20th and 21st century? Most every choice will be based on records in the 1900s with some in the 2000s.

I can't pick the greatest but I can name influences and writers who meant something to me. One of them from the 1800s would certainly be Stephen Foster.

I have a shirt emblazoned with the names of over 100 songwriters I admire. Here are the biggies, some of whom have been mentioned:

Bill Anderson
Bob McDill
Ben Peters
Dennis Linde
Don Gibson
Harold and Don Reid
Merle Haggard
Hank Williams
Dolly Parton
Don Schlitz/Paul Overstreet
Kris Kristofferson
Leon Payne
Otis Blackwell

Those are just a few.

These things are fun to debate - precisely because there is no real answer to them

Just for fun, I went to i-tunes and did a little poking around. "If You Could Read My Mind" has been covered by Streisand and Glen Campbell. What was more interesting though was that I found several different dance versions of it by various artists. Then an acappella version and a rock version too. Not to mention the orchestra versions. They all sounded great.

Early Morning Rain has been covered by Peter, Paul and Mary. But also by Elvis and, interestingly, Jerry Lee Lewis.

I like Sub's notion that a great songwriter can produce an album where every cut is great. When I listen to Lightfoot's Summertime Dream, I can't figure out how more of those weren't hits. Every song is gold. Same with Dream Street Rose and pretty close for Sundown.

Also, longevity is a factor, imo. There are a lot of one-hit wonders but to be able to produce quality songs over a 40 year period is the mark of something else.

Rambling at this point - haven't had breakfast yet...

It IS true that I answered with one of my favorites rather than the best - because the latter is impossible to define. Do I believe Gordon Lightfoot belongs on a list of "Best songwriters of the 20th and 21st centuries"? Maybe not, though he's certainly on my list. He's on Dylan's list of favorites too, along with Jimmy Buffett, Warren Zevon, John Prine and a couple others.

If he doesn't belong on the list though, he's damn close, imo.

I believe he has missed the elusive goal of being covered by Shatner - though I haven't done a search for that. To be honest, I'm kinda afraid to.

Scott

going back a few years, I'd add Fanny Crosby. She wrote about 8,000 hymns, many still very popular. I think she's 19th century though.
Her music still lives on, and probably will for some time.

My we are tetchy......My original remark was somewhat light hearted BUT unfortunately you took it literally and personal. You need to lighten up.
You were the one who started with the insults which I just laughed off as an OTT reaction from you. If that is the way you react to an innocuous comment God help us if you ever really are insulted. I thought that being a musician thickened skin.

Original quote. Doesn't look light hearted to me. Jim you bullied your way into this thread and 24 hours after my last response you want to laugh it off and get in the last word at the same time. You've done this before.

My skin is as thick as your head, so you succeeded. The thread is yours.

I "Bullied" my way into your thread?

MMMMMMM

I simply replied to your OPEN question.


Insults do not become you........ I would seek help about the complex you may have. At no time did I insult or degrade you..... that was just your mind working overtime but you seemed to go out of your way to try to insult me. Anyone reading this thread will know who is the thickhead in the wrong...and it is not me.

Bob Dylan went on record as saying Alice Cooper was the most underrated songwriter of his generation. I tend to agree.

Gotta give him credit for "School's Out"...gets airplay at least once a year...lol

Larry

Midnite Bob,

Imagining Paul Mccartney singing "Sundown" in the style of "Get Back" makes me a drug addict???

I think rather, it makes you have a lack of imagination!

When you said "But can you imagine anything of his being covered"
I sat for a minute, and I was easily able to imagine those artists singing those songs. To suggest that doing so makes me a drug addict is your problem, not mine. If it is an attempt at humor, I am not laughing. My post was a lighthearted attempt at having fun, and NOWHERE in it do I say anything to illicit such a response.

For the record, I have to be up at 4 AM most mornings to care for my dying 92 year old mother. Thanks for taking the time to get to know me before making such an offensive and judgmental statement to me; it tells me more about you than it does about me, however.

Mike