Favorite Seventies Artists In The News

Posted by Administrator on June 11th, 2023

The Partridge Family alum Danny Bonaduce, 63, told TMZ on June 2 he will undergo brain surgery after being diagnosed with hydrocephalus, a neurological disorder that results in fluid in the brain. He first opened up about the illness -- which has left him unable to walk -- in Apr. 2022 on his radio show. - People, 6/19/23...... Actress Marlene Clark, known for her roles in Sanford and Son and the 1973 horror film Ganja & Hess, died at her home in L.A. on May 18. She was 85. A cause of death was not announced. - People, 6/12/23...... Paul McCartney's new book of unseen Beatles photos, 1964: Eyes of the Storm has become a chart-topper even before its June 13 official release. The book, which features unseen photos from The Fab Four's first transatlantic tour, has reached No. 1 on the Amazon.com tally for new releases. According to the description, it contains "largely unseen photographs [taken by McCartney using a 35mm camera] capturing the explosive period, from the end of 1963 through early 1964, in which The Beatles became an international sensation and changed the course of music history." The book, which is also available in a Kindle edition, features 275 photos captured around six cities -- Liverpool, London, Paris, New York, Washington, D.C., and Miami. There is also an introduction by historian Jill Lepore, along with a personal foreword by Sir Paul as he recalls the emotions and events that took place as the band played for British concert halls, and the excitement from fans following their first visit to the U.S. In conjuction with the release of the book, actor Stanley Tucci is set to interview McCartney to open the new Beatles exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery in London on June 29. The "Paul McCartney Photographs 1963-64: Eyes Of The Storm" exhibit will run from June 28-Oct. 1, and on June 29 the former Beatle will be in conversation with Tucci for an in-person and live-streamed event on 2:00 pm BST. "Looking at these photos now, decades after they were taken, I find there's a sort of innocence about them," Macca said of the exhibition. "Everything was new to us at this point. But I like to think I wouldn't take them any differently today. They now bring back so many stories, a flood of special memories, which is one of the many reasons I love them all, and know that they will always fire my imagination. "The fact that these photographs have been taken by the National Portrait Gallery for their reopening after a lengthy renovation is humbling yet also astonishing - I'm looking forward to seeing them on the walls, 60 years on, and reminiscing about those times with the wonderful Stanley Tucci." Tucci added: "I am honoured and thrilled to interview Paul McCartney about these photos and that time in his extraordinary life. A life that has changed all of ours for the better." Tickets for the livestream are priced at £10 and available at the npg.or.uk site, with concession prices at £5. - Billboard/New Musical Express, 6/6/23...... The administration of Pres. Joe Biden weighed in on the controversy over Roger Waters on June 6, issuing a statement describing he Pink Floyd co-founder's recent performances as "antisemitic," an assessment shared by many in Israel and the pro-Israel community. "Roger Waters has a long track record of using antisemitic tropes," the State Department said, and asserted a concert he gave in late May in Germany "contained imagery that is deeply offensive to Jewish people and minimized the Holocaust." The comments came in a written response to a question posed at a June 5 State Department press briefing about whether the administration agreed with criticism of Waters from the U.S. special envoy to combat antisemitism, Deborah Lipstadt. "Special Envoy Lipstadt's quote-tweet speaks for itself," a spokesperson for the department said, adding "The concert in question, which took place in Berlin, contained imagery that is deeply offensive to Jewish people and minimized the Holocaust. The artist in question has a long track record of using antisemitic tropes to denigrate Jewish people." In a May 24 tweet after the concert in Berlin, during which Waters appeared on stage in a costume reminiscent of Nazi-era Germany, Lipstadt denounced the musician by echoing comments from EU antisemitism envoy Katharina von Schnurbein, who is German. "I wholeheartedly concur with @EUAntisemitism 's condemnation of Roger Waters and his despicable Holocaust distortion," Lipstadt wrote in reply to a tweet from von Schnurbein. Waters has rejected the accusations in a statement on Facebook and Instagram, saying "the elements of my performance that have been questioned are quite clearly a statement in opposition to fascism, injustice, and bigotry in all its forms." He claimed that "attempts to portray those elements as something else are disingenuous and politically motivated." Waters has also drawn the ire of the pro-Israel community for his outspoken support of the BDS movement, which calls for boycotts and sanctions against Israel. - Billboard, 6/7/23...... Joni Mitchell has announced the release of a new live album of her comeback live performance at Newport Folk Festival in July 2022. At Newport: Featuring the Joni Jam drops on July 28, and features Joni's 13-song "Joni Jam" that featured country singer Brandi Carlile on the tracks "Carey," "A Case of You" and "Big Yellow Tax." Meanwhile, on June 10, Mitchell gave her first headline performance in 23 years at the Gorge Amphitheatre in Washington state. The Canadian folk/rock legend recently opened up about her endeavours to re-learn the guitar in a recent interview with CBS Mornings, explaining that her ability to play guitar was one of the skills she lost following her aneurysm. "I'm learning. I'm looking at videos that are on the net, to see where to put my fingers," she said of her progress. "It's amazing... when you have an aneurysm, you don't know how to get into a chair. You don't know how to get out of bed. You have to learn all these things again. You're going back to infancy, almost." In 2022, Mitchell released the latest installment of her archival release series: a box-set of her albums issued on Asylum Records between 1972 and 1975. - NME, 6/10/23...... After the American Federation of Musicans' Local 802 union objected to David Byrne's planned usage of pre-recorded music in "Here Lies Love" Broadway musical in May, the former Talking Heads frontman has agreed that the production will go ahead with 12 musicians, all of whom are union members. "We are proud to announce that 'Here Lies Love' will have live music in the form of 12 musicians. Please see our statement on the agreement we've reached: pic.twitter.com/DTA52d5OWV," the union Tweeted on June 9. "Here Lies Love" was previously staged at the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art in 2012, New York's Public Theater in 2013, London's National Theater in 2014, and the Seattle Repertory Theater in 2017. The union claimed that the musical, which is set to premiere on Broadway on July 20 with previews, violated a contract clause requiring that at least 19 musicians are hired for all musicals staged at the Broadway Theater. Responding to criticism in The New York Times, a spokesperson for the production claimed that the decision to use pre-recorded music was "part of the karaoke genre inherent to the musical and the production concept." At the time, Byrne issued a statement of his own defending the production choices, explaining the "dance club track-act immersion" as part of the show's nontraditional staging. - NME, 6/10/23...... Eric Clapton announced on Twitter on June 6 that he will once again tour the UK and Ireland in 2024. Over the course of the limited tour, Slowhand will perform at the Utilita Arena in Newcastle on May 9; Liverpool's M&S Bank Arena on May 11; Birmingham's Resorts World Arena on May 13; the 3Arena in Dublin on May 16; and three shows at London's Royal Albert Hall in London on May 20 and 21. While only two Royal Albert shows have been listed on social media, a third date, on May 23, has been confirmed via Clapton's official website. Clapton most recently performed at the Royal Albert Hall in May, for two back-to-back tribute concerts to late fellow The Yardbirds alum Jeff Beck. Rod Stewart, Joe Perry, Kirk Hammett and Johnny Depp were among the other musicians who came performed at the tribute concerts. In 2022, he played two nights at the Royal Albert Hall as part of his UK and European headline tour. He was later forced to postpone two of the dates on the stint after contracting Covid-19. - NME, 6/9/23...... On June 10 Neil Young announced a West Coast US tour -- his first trek in four years -- during which he'll play songs rarely or never performed live before. Young's itinerary has 13 dates announced so far, including Los Angeles (7/1,2,4,5); Santa Barbara, Calif. (7/7); Paso Robles, Calif. (7/8); San Diego (7/11); Los Angeles (7/13); Berkeley, Calif. (7/15); Bend, Ore. (7/17); Ridgefield, Wash. (7/18); Auburn, Wash. (7/20); and Napa, Calif. (7/23). In a Zoom call with subscribers of his Neil Young Archives website on June 7, Young revealed he'll be playing around 15 songs that he has rarely or never played live before. "I don't want to come back and do the same songs again," he said. "I'll feel like I was on some sort of carnival ride. I'd rather be doing these others songs I haven't done.... I won't have to compare how I'm doing 'Heart of Gold' to [how I played it in] 1970, 1980, 1990, 2000, 2010, 2020.... They're not new songs. They're old songs. But I wake up with them in my head every morning." He added: "They are songs that apply to my life right now, and apply to everyone's lives in this era that we're in. Some of them were written 10, 20, 30, 40 years ago, but never really played live." - NME, 6/10/23...... Giles Martin, the music producer son of the late Beatles studio wizard George Martin, insists The Beatles "wouldn't have made" Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band without The Beach Boys' Pet Sounds. Giles, 53, has just worked his magic on a new mix of the seminal 1966 Pet Sounds album -- which featured the hit singles "God Only Knows" and "Wouldn't It Be Nice" -- in Dolby Atmos, which is available to stream now. Martin heaped praise on BB principal Brian Wilson, 80, and insisted the Fab Four's 1967 masterpiece wouldn't sound like it does without taking influence from Pet Sounds. Recalling a conversation with his dad, Giles shared with MusicRadar.com: "I was with my dad on a plane once, and I just suddenly realised how awesome he was. I said to him 'Dad, what you did with The Beatles was kind of amazing, wasn't it' and he looked at me and said: 'not as amazing as Brian Wilson'. He explained to me that The Beatles always had him, and he had The Beatles. But Brian Wilson didn't have anyone, and he went and made this record. Without this record, The Beatles wouldn't have made Sgt Pepper." Giles adds thanks to Dolby Atmos technology, fans can hear instruments they never heard before on the original mix. Giles previously created Dolby Atmos mixes for a series of special Beatles releases, including 2022's acclaimed Revolver reissue. - Music-News.com, 6/8/23...... Concertgoers at the upcoming 2023 edition of the UK's legendary Glastonbury festival have been invited to take part in another record-breaking attempt to form the world's largest ever human "peace sign." This follows the last attempt in 2017 when around 15,000 people met at the festival to break the previous record, set by a crowd of 5,814 in New York in 2009. SJ Smallpage, who helped organize the 2017 record, said at the time: "I feel very humbled that people have joined together for something that represents everything that is good about Glastonbury, everything that is good about humanity." On June 7, a tweet from the festival's information page was posted that said: "A message to the world of Peace, Unity and Love. On Thursday June 22 at 11.30am in Kings Meadow, unite with us in the Green Fields to send out the message once again!" The likes of Blondie, Lizzo, Lana Del Ray and Wizkid are set to perform at the festival at Worthy Farm in Somerset from June 23-25, with headline performances also coming from Guns N' Roses and Elton John, an experience he promised will be "wonderful." "I have played festivals, and have really enjoyed them," Sir Elton said recently. "But of course Glastonbury is the crme de la crme. To be honest with you, it's the first time I've been asked to play it. It's just come at the right time. I'm a great believer in serendipity and fate - this is the most wonderful way to sign off in England." - NME, 6/8/23...... KISS bassist/vocalist Gene Simmons has surprised many in the UK with his call for the restoration of power sharing in Northern Ireland. According to the BBC, Simmons appeared to argue that Stormont -- the Northern Ireland Assembly -- must be restored to look after people's needs, and that he hopes "everything gets back in order in Northern Ireland and the people's business should be done by their elected officials." His comments came as he was visiting Parliament as a guest of the Democratic Unionist Party MP Ian Paisley. "One of our crew happened I guess to know him or they discussed something, and I guess he was a big fan," Simmons told the BBC, revealing that the band's private jet was struggling to find a place to land in the UK for their tour before Paisley stepped in. Simmons later Tweeted that "visiting the UK Parliament, by invite of MP Ian Paisley was truly an honor. Here I am with two gentleman in Parliament who wanted to make sure I was behaving myself." Simmons added: "I was grateful of course and went down to the House of Commons and met Ian and everybody. It was actually quite an amazing day. The history and the hallowed halls of democracy, it was very inspiring." He also argued that "Northern Ireland is just as important as any country on the face of the planet and you can't have people pointing fingers.... People have their lives to lead and it's the government's job to take care of people's needs." MP Paisley described Simmons as "a real knowledgeable guy" about the history of Parliament, with "a genuine interest both in the history and the theology behind all this stuff." Social media users reacted in surprise to the bizarre news, with one posting "I appear to have dropped acid in the middle of the night." Meanwhile, KISS is set to perform at London's The O2 on July 5, Manchester's AO Arena on July 7, and Glasgow's OVO Hydro on July 8. - NME, 6/8/23...... Grammy-winning New Age pianist George Winston, who blended jazz, classical, folk and other stylings on such million-selling albums as Autumn, Winter Into Spring and December, died on June 4 after a 10-year battle with cancer. He was 73. The Hart, Mich. native, who grew up in Montana, Florida and Mississippi, drew upon influences ranging from Fats Waller to The Doors. He released more than a dozen solo piano albums, along with soundtracks for the TV miniseries This Is America, Charlie Brown and The Velveteen Rabbit, which featured Meryl Streep's narration of the children's classic. His 1995 release Forest won a Grammy for Best New Age Recording among nominations in his career -- most recently, a Best New Age Album nod for Montana: A Love Story in 2006. "I came up with the melodic style that I play in 1971, and I have always called it 'Folk Piano' (or more accurately 'Rural Folk Piano'), since it is melodic and not complicated in its approach, like folk guitar picking and folk songs, and has a rural sensibility," reads a quote from a Q&A section on his website. "I just play the songs the best I can, inspired by the seasons and the topographies and regions, and, occasionally, by sociological elements, and try to improve as a player over time." Announcing his death, the website posted: "Throughout his cancer treatments, George continued to write and record new music, and he stayed true to his greatest passion: performing for live audiences while raising funds for Feeding America to help fight the national hunger crisis along with donating proceeds from each of his concerts to local food banks." - Billboard, 6/7/23...... Brazilian bossa nova singer Astrud Gilberto, famous for her 1964 hit "The Girl From Ipanema," passed away on June 5 at the age of 83. Her death was confirmed by her son Marcelo to Paul Ricci, a New York-based guitarist who had collaborated with Astrud, who shared the sad news with his followers on Facebook. "She was an important part of ALL that is Brazilian music in the world and she changed many lives with her energy. RIP from 'the chief,' as she called me. Thanks AG," he posted. During her career, which began in the 1960s, Astrud -- who was born Astrud Evangelina Weinert in Salvador, Bahia -- recorded 16 studio albums and two live records, and helped make bossa nova a sensation in the 1960s. But her biggest hit "The Girl From Ipanema" happened by accident. The track, originally titled "Garota de Ipanema," was composed in 1962 by Antonio Carlos Jobim and Vin'cius de Moraes, inspired by the pair's crush on Heloisa Pinheiro, a teenage girl who used to walk past their local bar near Ipanema beach. It was recorded again by American saxophonist Stan Getz and Brazilian guitarist Joao Gilberto on Mar. 18, 1963. Astrud just happened to be in the studio and offered to sing on the track after it was suggested that her husband Joao -- who Astrud wed in 1959 -- perform the lyrics that had been translated from Portuguese to English by Norman Gimbel. Speaking to JazzWax in 2010, engineer Phil Ramone -- who was present at the recording in New York in 1962 -- said: "Astrud was in the control room when Norm came in with the English lyrics. Producer Creed Taylor said he wanted to get the song done right away and looked around the room. Astrud volunteered, saying she could sing in English. Creed said, 'Great.' Astrud wasn't a professional singer, but she was the only victim sitting there that night." Astrud's version became a global smash selling more than five million copies and earning her a Grammy nomination for Best Vocal Performance by a Female and winning the Grammy for Song of the Year. However, she did not profit from the song's huge success, earning only $120 in session fees. Though Gilberto would not have another major hit, later in her career she received the Latin Jazz USA Award for Lifetime Achievement in 1992 and was inducted into the International Latin Music Hall of Fame in 2002. Gilberto was also nominated for Best New Artist of 1964, but lost to The Beatles. She was nominated for Best Vocal Performance -- female in both 1964 and 1965, but lost to Barbra Streisand both years. - Bang Showbiz, 6/6/23.

Stevie Van Zandt, a founding member of Bruce Springsteen's E Street Band, has just formed an Artist Council for his TeachRock free educational initiative he launched in 2006 to help K-12 educators and students. The Artist Council includes such famous names as Sheryl Crow, Peter Gabriel, Norah Jones, DJ Khaled, Margo Price, Marty Stuart, Erykah Badu, Common and Taboo. Musicians on the Artist Council will participate in lesson plans and work directly with students and educators using the curriculum, and will join Bruce Springsteen, Jackson Browne and director Martin Scorsese, who are members of TeachRock's Founders Board. TeachRock includes hundreds of lesson plans and musician bios, and its "Rock and Soul of America" high school history course is taught in several states, including California, Colorado, New Mexico, Ohio, Connecticut, New York and New Jersey. Van Zandt started TeachRock after a group of music education activists approached him concerned about cuts in arts funding in schools following the passage of the No Child Left Behind legislation. - Billboard, 6/5/23...... Billy Joel announced on June 1 that his epic, decade-long residency at New York's Madison Square Garden will come to an end in 2024 after 150 shows. The 74-year-old piano man was joined by New York Mayor Eric Adams for a press conference that revealed a final 10-show run by Joel at the famous venue will kick-off on Oct. 20 and wrap early next year. "There's only one thing that's more New York than Billy Joel -- and that's a Billy Joel concert at MSG," Mayor Adams said. "For more than 50 years, Billy's music has defined our city and brought us together. On behalf of 8.5 million New Yorkers, congratulations, Billy, on a historic run of sold-out shows at MSG, and thank you for a lifetime of bringing joy to us all." "If you google Billy Joel's house, they showed Madison Square Garden, which is kind of cool," Joel quipped during the presser. "I never found my bedroom though." Joel's MSG residency was announced nearly a decade ago, in Dec. 2013. After the first performance, in Jan. 2014, the singer went on to set MSG records: Most Lifetime Performances By Any Artist (136 shows) and Most Consecutive Performances (90 shows). Although he hasn't released an album of new material since 1993, in 2018 he told The New York Times that his touring business "is bigger now than it was at the height of my recording career." In 2006 he set the venue record for most consecutive performances by an artist with 12 gigs in a row, which was celebrated with a "Joel-12" banner getting raised to the building's rafters. Joel said the idea for the residency was born after he was recovering from hip surgery, and he decided to play one a month as long as fans kept showing up. And they did, with Joel breaking his own 12-show record within a year, then hitting his 100th lifetime gig in July 2018, prompting then-Gov. Andrew Cuomo to dub July 18, 2018 "Billy Joel Day." After that performance, he told The Times he didn't think he would keep the residency going long enough to play 200 shows. "I'm still exhausted from the other night, which didn't used to happen," Joel said. "I don't think I'll have the physical wherewithal to do it five years from now. If I can't do it as well I want to, I'll take myself out of the lineup... I love the game too much to not play it well," he added. Tickets for the final MSG shows will go on sale to the general public on June 9 and be available at the MSG box office the following day. - Billboard, 6/1/23...... Country singer Tanya Tucker made what is believed to be a first in the 97-year-old history of the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville on June 2 when she rode a horse onto the stage at the beginning of her set. Tucker, who had a country hit in 1973 with a version of "Delta Dawn" and two years later charted a Top 40 pop hit with "Lizzie and the Rainman," was seated astride a black Friesian Stallion named Lauwe the Magnificent to sing her opening song, "Kindness," during the Opry broadcast. Tucker also rode Lauwe the Magnificent through the streets of Nashville in early April, just hours after the revelation that she had been named as a member of the Country Music Hall of Fame, and the announcement of two headlining shows at the Opry's original location, the Ryman Auditorium, on June 3 and 4. Tucker is long known for her passion for horses, and the cover of her new album Sweet Western Sound features a horse, while the cover of her previous Grammy-winning project, While I'm Livin', also features Tucker on horseback. Tucker posted about her latest Opry performance on Instagram, and will be formally inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame this fall. - Billboard, 6/3/23...... On June 5 Brian Eno announced on Twitter that his first-ever solo tour in his 50+ year career will kick off on Oct. 21 in Venice, Italy. His seven-show European tour also includes another show in Venice later the same day, Berlin (10/24), Paris (10/26), Utrecht, Netherlands (10/28), and two shows at London's Royal Festival Hall on Oct. 30. Eno's tour is built behind his 2016 album The Ship, and the live shows will feature both new and old compositions from his catalog. The Baltic Sea Philharmonic with conductor Kristjan Jrvi, actor Peter Serafinowicz, and Eno's longtime collaborators Leo Abrahams and Peter Chilvers will all back the musician on the tour. "The album 'The Ship' is an unusual piece in that it uses voice but doesn't particularly rely on the song form. It's an atmosphere with occasional characters drifting through it, characters lost in the vague space made by the music," shared Eno in a press release. "There's a sense of wartime in the background, and a sense of inevitability. There is also a sense of scale which suits an orchestra, and a sense of many people working together." Though he toured with Roxy Music in the 1970s and has sporadically toured with other artists, Eno has only played the occasional one-off solo shows, usually as part of festival programs. In 2021, he and his brother, Roger Eno, performed live at the Acropolis in Greece. He has also contributed to Peter Gabriel's long-awaited, upcoming solo effort i/o, due out sometime in 2023. - New Musical Express, 6/5/23...... The late Tina Turner has topped a whopping 40 million U.S. streams in the week following her May 24 death at age 83. Across all her work, Turner's songs captured 40.1 million U.S. on-demand streams from May 24-30 -- up from 2.7 million May 17-23 -- a 1,367% increase. "What's Love Got To Do With It" led all of the diva's songs, with 7.2 million clicks May 24-30, up 686% from 912,000 in the previous seven days. The 1984 Billboard Hot 100 No. 1 was the main driver behind her monumental comeback that year. It became her sole Hot 100 No. 1, and won Turner two Grammy Awards, including Record of the Year. "The Best" claimed second place among Turner's streamed songs from May 24-30, with 4.5 million on-demand clicks, up 1,022%. Tina's 1989 cover of the Bonnie Tyler track became one of her signature songs, inspiring the title of her 1991 greatest-hits set, Simply the Best. The same phrase became a common refrain in many tributes and eulogies on social media. Ike & Tina Turner's 1971 classic "Proud Mary" cover ranked third from May 24-30 with 3.9 million on-demand streams (up 1,132%). Two cuts from Turner's 1984 LP, Private Dancer, the title track (2.04 million, up 2,502%) and "Better Be Good to Me (1.8 million, up 1,714%), round out the top five. - Billboard, 6/2/23...... A newly unearthed draft of Queen's famous 1975 hit "Bohemian Rhapsody" has revealed that the song originally had a different name and lyrics. The lyrics, along with roughly 1,500 items from Queen frontman Freddie Mercury's home, are currently on display in a new auction exhibition at Sotheby's Auction House in London. According to one of 15 pages from early drafts for the rock opera, the famous 1975 hit penned by Mercury was shown to be titled "Mongolian Rhapsody" which is crossed out on a piece of paper from the now-defunct airline, British Midland Airways. It is expected to fetch between $100,000-$150,000,000 when it goes up for auction this fall. Some of the other items in the display, which will be showcased at Sotheby's London from Aug. 5-Sept. 5 and can be viewed on Twitter, include the manuscripts for "Somebody To Love," "We Are The Champions" and "'Don't Stop Me Now" which are all autographed by Mercury. Roughly 1,500 items from Mercury's London home, which had gone untouched for 30 years, are also available to view, and include a pair of Freddie's high-top Adidas sneakers, his aviator sunglasses, a personal leather jacket and other iconic Queen items . A portion of the sale's income will go the Mercury Phoenix Trust and the Elton John Aids Foundation. In other Queen-related news, it was also recently announced that a new extensive exhibition capturing the history of the band through Brian May's own stereoscopic (3-D) camera lenses will run in London from June 2 through Sept. 23. - NME, 6/1/23...... That '70s Show actor Danny Masterson has reportedly been put in "administrative segregation" at the L.A. County Men's Central Jail after the 47-year-old was found guilty of drugging and raping two women on May 31. Masterson is being housed there "for his own safety," and it is the same unit where such fellow famous faces as Suge Knight and O.J. Simpson previously stayed. Masterson is awaiting sentencing for the two attacks, and he was also accused of drugging the women before assaulting them. The seven women and five men jury failed to reach a verdict on a third count that alleged he raped a long-time girlfriend. It was also alleged that Masterson -- who did not testify on his own behalf -- used his links to the Church of Scientology to escape the repercussions for years. Bang Showbiz, 6/3/23...... Grammy-winning lyricist Cynthia Weil, who wrote dozens of indelible pop hits with husband Barry Mann over a six-decade career including such classics as "You've Lost That Lovin' Feelin'" for The Righteous Brothers and "We Gotta Get Out of This Place" for The Animals, died on June 2 of undisclosed causes. She was 82. Ms. Weil and Barry Mann were one of the most formidable songwriting teams to set up residence at producer Don Kirshner's Aldon Music on 1650 Broadway in Manhattan in the 1960s, which housed fellow pop songwriting powerhouses such as Carole King and Gerry Goffin. Born on Oct. 18, 1940 in New York City, Ms. Weil studied ballet and piano as a child, but after graduating from Sarah Lawrence University with a theater major she scored a job working for composer Frank Loesser at 20 and soon met Mann, whom she married in 1961. After scoring their first hit that year with Tony Orlando's "Bless You," the pair became regular collaborators with "Wall of Sound" producer Phil Spector, with whom they worked on The Ronettes' "Walking in the Rain" and The Crystals' "He's Sure the Boy I Love." The couple landed their most enduring chart-topper in 1965 with the blue-eyed soul smash "You've Lost That Lovin' Feelin'," a No. 1 hit produced by Spector that has been covered dozens of times and became "the most-played song on radio and TV in the 20th century," according to BMI. The 1970s brought collabs with rockers Blood Sweat & Tears ("So Long Dixie"), B.J. Thomas ("Here You Come Again ) and The Grass Roots ("Mamacita"), as their hot streak continued into the 1980s with Bill Medley's "Don't Know Much," which was a No. 2 hit for Linda Ronstadt and Aaron Neville in 1989, winning a Grammy in 1990 for Best Pop Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal. Weil and Mann also wrote hits for the likes of Dionne Warwick, Bette Midler, The Pointer Sisters and Jeffrey Osborne, and as a solo composer composed hits for the Pointers ("He's So Shy"), Barry Manilow, Lionel Richie ("Running with the Night"), Peabo Bryson, Chaka Khan, Sheena Easton and Martina McBride. Ms. Weil received the Ahmet Ertegun Award at the 2010 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction (which she shared with Mann), and was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1987, and landed the first-ever National Academy of Songwriters Life Achievement Award (both with Mann), as well as the Songwriting Hall of Fame's highest honor, the Johnny Mercer Award in 2011. Mann & Weil received a trustees award from the Recording Academy in 2015. "We lost the beautiful, brilliant lyricist Cynthia Weil Mann," Carole King said in a statement. "The four of us were close, caring friends despite our fierce competition to write the next hit for an artist with a #1 song.... May the legacy of lyrics by Cynthia Weil continue to speak to and for generations to come. Rest in peace with love and gratitude." Ms. Weil is survived by Mann, 84, and their daughter, Jenn. - Billboard, 6/2/23...... Actor Barry Newman, best known for his starring role in the 1971 action film Vanishing Point and who had the lead in the 1974-76 TV series Petrocelli, died of natural causes on May 11, his wife Angela revealed to The Hollywood Reporter on June 5. Mr. Newman, who was 92, enjoyed significant success on Broadway before he appeared in the 1970 courtroom drama The Lawyer, which was loosely based on a real-life murder case. Mr. Newman was subsequently cast alongside Cleavon Little and Dean Jagger in Vanishing Point, in which he played the part of Kowalski, a Vietnam war veteran and a dishonorably discharged police officer who is tasked with driving a Dodge Challenger across the U.S. while he tries to avoid becoming embroiled in a criminal conspiracy. Vanishing Point, directed by Richard C. Sarafian, has developed a cult following over the years, with Steven Spielberg even citing it as one of his all-time favorite films. The Boston-born actor later starred in the TV legal drama Petrocelli, which was actually inspired by his appearance in The Lawyer, with the actor reprising his role for the TV series. He played the part of Tony Petrocelli, a Harvard-educated lawyer who turned his back on city life in order to practise law in a sleepy part of Arizona. More recently, the actor made appearances in a string of well-known Hollywood movies, including Bowfinger, 40 Days and 40 Nights and The Limey. Mr. Newman also had recurring roles in various hit TV shows, including L.A. Law, NYPD Blue, The O.C. and Murder, She Wrote. Mr. Newman, who passed away at the New York-Presbyterian Columbia University Irving Medical Center, is survived by his wife Angela. - Bang Showbiz, 6/5/23.