Songwriting Legends Carole Bayer Sager and Mike Stoller To Be Honored as BMI Icons at 70th Annual BMI Pop Awards
Evening Also Celebrates the Top Pop Songwriters and Music Publishers on Tuesday, May 10 in Beverly Hills
BMI is thrilled to celebrate the best in songwriting at the 70TH Annual BMI Pop Awards. Legendary music creators Carole Bayer Sager and Mike Stoller will be honored as BMI Icons, celebrating their indelible and timeless contributions to the art of songwriting. BMI’s Pop Song of the Year, Songwriter of the Year, Publisher of the Year and BMI’s top 50 most-performed pop songs in the U.S. of the previous year will also be named. The private event, hosted by BMI President and CEO Mike O’Neill and Vice President Worldwide Creative Barbara Cane, will be held on Tuesday, May 10 at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel in Beverly Hills, CA.
“BMI is thrilled to be honoring two iconic songwriters, Carole Bayer Sager and Mike Stoller, alongside the creators of some of today’s most-performed songs,” said Cane. “As we commemorate BMI’s 70th Pop Awards, we pay homage to the craft of these two musical legends and their timeless contributions to BMI and the great American songbook. We’re proud to present them with the BMI Icon Award for their lasting impression on fans worldwide and on the songwriters following the path they’ve laid out to musical greatness, which is second to none.”
With a career spanning over five decades, GRAMMY and Academy Award-winning songwriter Carole Bayer Sager is responsible for lyrics to some of the most popular songs of our time, including “Nobody Does It Better,” “A Groovy Kind of Love,” “Don’t Cry Out Loud,” and the Oscar-winning theme from the movie Arthur, “Best That You Can Do.” She’s written more than 400 songs that transcend generations and has worked with some of the biggest stars in music, such as Ray Charles, Celine Dion, Bob Dylan, Neil Diamond, Kenny “Babyface” Edmonds, Aretha Franklin, Whitney Houston, Michael Jackson, Carole King, Melissa Manchester, Reba McEntire, Bette Midler, Dolly Parton, Carly Simon, Frank Sinatra, Barbra Streisand and many more.
Sager has received many accolades and honors throughout her illustrious career, including 26 BMI Awards, and she was named BMI’s Pop Songwriter of the Year in 1977. She’s also received an Oscar, two Golden Globe Awards, a GRAMMY win for Song of the Year for “That What Friends Are For,” and a combined 15 nominations. Adding to her collection of prestigious awards, Sager has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, and in 2019, she was the recipient of the Johnny Mercer Award, the highest honor bestowed by the Songwriters Hall of Fame.
World-renowned songwriter Mike Stoller is one-half of the legendary team of Leiber & Stoller, whose iconic partnership spanned decades with countless chart-topping songs among their hugely successful repertoire. Together, they wrote over 20 songs for Elvis Presley, including “Hound Dog,” “Love Me,” and “Jailhouse Rock,” and wrote and produced all the hit songs performed by The Coasters, such as “Searchin’,” “Yakety Yak,” “Charlie Brown,” and “Poison Ivy” to name a few. Other timeless classics written by the pair include “Love Potion Number 9,” “I’m A Woman,” and “Is That All There Is?” as well as “On Broadway” co-written with Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil and “Stand by Me” co-written with Ben E. King. The hit musical Smokey Joe’s Cafe: The Songs of Leiber & Stoller won a GRAMMY Award in 1995, was nominated for seven Tony Awards and is the longest-running musical revue in Broadway history.
Other accolades for Stoller include being inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame (1985) and the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame (1987). He received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame (1994) and his handprints are embedded at the Hollywood RockWalk on Sunset Boulevard (1994). Over his acclaimed career, Stoller has also been honored with a Trustee GRAMMY Award (1999), Johnny Mercer Award by the National Academy of Popular Music/Songwriters Hall of Fame (2000), an Ivor Novello International Songwriters Award (2000) and an impressive 57 BMI Awards, among others.
As the newest BMI Icon honorees, Carole Bayer Sager and Mike Stoller join 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 Barry Manilow, The Bee Gees, Brian Wilson, Carlos Santana, Carole King, Crosby, Stills & Nash, David Foster, Dolly Parton, the Jacksons, John Fogerty, Kris Kristofferson, Mann & Weil, Merle Haggard, Nile Rodgers, Paul Simon, Stevie Nicks, Sting and Willie Nelson, among others.
BMI’s family of songwriters and publishers will also be celebrated throughout the evening with the revealing of the 50 most-performed pop songs in the United States from BMI’s repertoire of more than 18.7 million musical works.
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