NEW YORK, NY--(Marketwired - March 31, 2017) - Broadcast Music, Inc. (BMI) is pleased to announce that GRAMMY, EMMY and TONY Award-winning singer-songwriter, arranger, producer and musician, Barry Manilow, will be named the BMI Icon at the 65th annual BMI Pop Awards. Mr. Manilow, a pop music legend, will receive this honor in recognition of his prodigious musical legacy and an unparalleled career encompassing the worlds of Broadway, Film, TV, and popular culture. The celebratory event will be held Tuesday, May 9th at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel in Beverly Hills, hosted by BMI President & CEO Mike O'Neill and BMI Vice President of Writer/Publisher Relations Barbara Cane.
"Barry Manilow is a visionary whose exceptional body of work has shaped the course of popular music for over five decades," said Cane. "He has left a lasting imprint on every aspect of music, influenced the careers of his contemporaries, and touched the lives of many with his unique gift of artistry. His musical brilliance defies genre expectations and I cannot think of a more deserving recipient."
The evening will also recognize the songwriters, publishers, and administrators of the past year's most-performed pop songs in the United States from BMI's repertoire of nearly 12 million musical works. The BMI Pop Song, Songwriter and Publisher of the Year will be named during the ceremony.
As a BMI Icon, Mr. Manilow joins an elite group of songwriters who have received BMI's highest honor for their "unique and indelible influence on generations of music makers." Previous recipients include Sting, Mann & Weil, Nile Rodgers, Stevie Nicks, Paul Simon, Carole King, David Foster, John Fogerty, Kris Kristofferson, the Jacksons, Crosby, Stills & Nash, the Bee Gees, Willie Nelson, Merle Haggard, Brian Wilson, Carlos Santana and Dolly Parton, among others.
Barry Manilow is one of the world's bestselling recording artists with more than 85 million albums sold worldwide. A Songwriters Hall of Fame inductee, Manilow has triumphed in every medium of entertainment with an iconic career touching virtually every aspect of music. He's had an astonishing 50 Top 40 singles, including 12 #1s and 27 Top 10 hits, five of his albums were on the best-seller charts simultaneously, and is ranked at the #1 Adult Contemporary Artist of all-time, according to Billboard and R&R magazines.
Upon entering the music business, he split his creative energies between Off-Broadway musicals and Madison Avenue jingle mills, where he wrote a variety of unforgettable jingles for State Farm and Band-Aids. His singing could be heard on campaigns for Kentucky Fried Chicken, Pepsi, Dr. Pepper and in McDonald's iconic "You Deserve a Break Today." In 1971, he began a musical association with Bette Midler that would propel each of their careers forward while changing the course of popular music itself, after co-producing her first two albums The Divine Miss M and Bette Midler.
Since then, Mr. Manilow has garnered numerous awards and accolades, including 11 Grammy nominations and a Grammy Award for Best Pop Male Vocal Performance in 1979 (for "Copacabana"), two Emmy's (Barry Manilow: Music and Passion, The Barry Manilow Special), a Tony Award (Barry Manilow on Broadway) and three American Music Awards in the category of Favorite Pop/Rock Male Artist. If there's a secret to his success, it lies in one simple musical principle. "I like a melody," he admits. "I like a song that has a lyric you remember and a melody you can't forget. That's always been my mantra whenever I'm composing anything."
He is currently preparing for the release of his new record, This Is My Town: Songs of New York, an homage to his hometown of New York City due to hit shelves April 21, 2017.
PRESS CREDENTIALS: To request press credentials, visit http://www.bmi.com/press#credentials.
Press credentials will be for red-carpet arrivals only. A limited number of media will be credentialed to cover the awards ceremony.
ABOUT BMI:
Celebrating over 76 years of service to songwriters, composers, music publishers and businesses, Broadcast Music, Inc.® (BMI®) is a global leader in music rights management, serving as an advocate for the value of music. BMI represents the public performance rights in nearly 12 million musical works created and owned by more than 750,000 songwriters, composers, and music publishers. The Company negotiates music license agreements and distributes the fees it generates as royalties to its affiliated writers and publishers when their songs are performed in public. In 1939, BMI created a groundbreaking open-door policy becoming the only performing rights organization to welcome and represent the creators of blues, jazz, country, and American roots music. Today, the musical compositions in BMI's repertoire, from chart toppers to perennial favorites, span all genres of music and are consistently among the most-performed hits of the year. For additional information and the latest BMI news, visit www.bmi.com, follow us on Twitter @BMI or stay connected through Broadcast Music, Inc.'s Facebook page. Sign up for BMI's The Weekly and receive our e-newsletter every Monday to stay up to date on all things music.
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