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Marie Dionne Warrick (born December 12, 1940), known professionally as Dionne Warwick, is an acclaimed five-time Grammy Award-winning African American singer best known for her work with Hal David and Burt Bacharach as songwriters and producers.
Born to parents Mansel Warrick (a gospel record promoter for Chess Records) and Lee Drinkard (manager of The Drinkard Singers) in East Orange, New Jersey.
Her first performances began when she occasionally sang with the Drinkard Singers in the late 1950s. In 1960, while studying at Hartt College of Music (a school from which she now holds a Doctorate), Dionne, Myrna Utley, and Carol Slade, along with Dionne's sister Delia (known professionally as Dee Dee Warwick) formed their own group called the "The Gospelaires". Their first official performance was at the world famous Apollo Theatre, where they won the weekly amateur contest.
This led to the group being asked to sing background sessions at recording studios in New York for such artists as Ben E. King, Chuck Jackson, Dinah Washington and Solomon Burke. While performing as background on The Drifters' recording of "Mexican Divorce", Dionne's voice and star presence were noticed by the song's composer Burt Bacharach, who was about to begin writing songs with a new partner named Hal David. This fortunate meeting marked the ascent to stardom for both singer and songwriter. Dionne was signed to Bacharach and David's production company, which in turn signed to Scepter Records in 1962.
Her first solo single for Scepter Records was released in November, 1962. The song was entitled "Don't Make Me Over", the title (according to the A&E Biography of Dionne Warwick) supplied by Warrick herself when she snapped the phrase at producers Burt Bacharach and Hal David. Warwick became incensed and shouted the phrase when she found a song she wanted to record, "Make It Easy on Yourself" had been given to another artist, Jerry Butler. From the phrase, Bacharach and David created an elegant R&B recording, which became a top 40 pop hit (#21) in the US (and a top 5 US R&B hit.) Famously, Warrick's name was misspelled on the credits, and she soon began using the new spelling (i.e., "Warwick") both professionally and personally.
The two immediate follow-ups to "Don't Make Me Over" -- "Make The Music Play" and "This Empty Place" -- were largely unsuccessful, but 1963's "Anyone Who Had a Heart" was Warwick's first top 10 pop hit (#8). This was followed by "Walk on By" in April 1964, a major hit that launched her career into the stratosphere. For the rest of the 1960s, Warwick was a fixture on the US and Canadian charts, and virtually all of Warwick's singles from 1962-1971 were written and produced by the Bacharach/David team.
In fact, Warwick weathered the British Invasion better than most American artists, although she released only a few hits in the UK during the late 1960s, most notably "Walk On By" and "Do You Know the Way to San Jose". In the UK a number of Bacharach-David-Warwick songs were covered by UK singer Cilla Black, most notably "Anyone Who Had a Heart", which went to #1 in the UK. This upset Warwick and she has described feeling insulted when told that in the UK, record company executives wanted her songs recorded by someone else. Warwick even met Cilla Black whilst on tour in the UK. She recalled what she said to her - " I told her that "You're My World" would be my next single in the States. I honestly believe that if I'd sneezed on my next record, then Cilla would have sneezed on hers too. There was no imagination in her recording."
"You're My World" was, in fact, not released as a single by Warwick -- but it did appear on a later album, Dionne Warwick in Valley of the Dolls. Black wasted no time in releasing a version of the song herself, with the single release of "You're My World" peaking at #1 UK, #26 US in 1964.
Warwick was named the Bestselling Female Vocalist in the Cash Box Magazine Poll in 1964, with six chart hits in that year. Cash Box also named her the Top Female Vocalist in 1969, 1970 and 1971. In the 1967 Cash Box Poll, she was second only to Petula Clark, and in 1968's poll second only to Aretha Franklin. Playboy Magazine's influential Music Poll of 1970 named her the Top Female Vocalist. In 1969, Harvard's Hasty Pudding Society named her Woman of the Year.
The late 1960s and early 1970s became a very successful time period for Warwick, who saw a string of Gold selling albums and Top 20 and Top 10 hit singles. "Message to Michael", a Bacharach-David song that the duo was certain was a "man's song", became a huge hit for Warwick in May of 1966. The 1967 LP called Here Where There Is Love was her first RIAA Gold Album and featured the hits "Alfie", "Trains and Boats and Planes", and "I Just Don't Know What to Do With Myself". Later that same year, Warwick earned a her first RIAA Gold Single for the single "I Say a Little Prayer" (on her album The Windows of the World).
Her next big hit was unusual in that it was not written by Burt Bacharach and Hal David, and it was a song that she almost didn't record. While the film version of "Valley of the Dolls" was being made, actress Barbara Parkins suggested that Warwick be considered to sing the film's theme song, written by songwriting team Andre and Dory Previn. The song was to be given to Judy Garland who had been fired from the film. Warwick performed the song, and when the film became a success in the early weeks of 1968, the public wanted a recording of the theme. Warwick returned to A&R Studios in New York and recorded a Pat Williams-arranged version of the theme, which was released as the flip side of "I Say A Little Prayer". As such, "(Theme From) Valley of the Dolls" was a smash success (#2-4 weeks), as was the Bacharach/David-penned follow-up, "Do You Know the Way to San José". More hits ("Promises, Promises"-#19, "I'll Never Fall In Love Again"-#6, "You've Lost That Lovin' Feeling"-#15, "This Girl's In Love With You"-#7, "Make It Easy On Yourself"-#37, "Who Is Gonna Love Me"-#33, "The April Fools"-#37, "Let Me Go To Him"-#32) followed into 1971.
Warwick had become the priority act of Scepter Records with the release of "Anyone Who Had a Heart" in 1963. However, in the post-Woodstock era of the late 1960s, changing tastes in music and a dispute between Bacharach and David's production company with Scepter resulted the decision was made that she would begin looking for a major label. Warwick's last recording, the soundtrack for the motion picture "The Love Machine" (in which she appeared in an uncredited cameo) for Scepter was in 1971.
Later that same year Warwick was signed to Warner Brothers Records for what was at the time the most lucrative recording contract ever given a female vocalist according to Variety. Her debut on Warners was the self-titled album "Dionne" (not to be confused with her later Arista debut album) in January of 1972. The album peaked at #57 on the Billboard Hot 100 Album Chart.
Warwick had signed with Warners with Bacharach and David as writers and producers. However, after the "Lost Horizon" disaster of 1973, the songwriting duo not only wasn't working together, they weren't even speaking. While this situation worked itself out in the courts, Warwick would team with a variety of producers, looking for an elusive hit.
Warwick was advised by numerologist Linda Goodman in 1971 to add an "e" to her last name, making Warwick "Warwicke" for good luck. The extra "e" brought more bad luck than good, and the singer removed it in 1975. Faced with the prospect of being sued by Warners, in 1975 Warwick was forced to file a $5.5 million lawsuit against Bacharach and David for Breach of Contract. The suit was settled out of court in 1979, reportedly for $5 million including the rights to all Warwick recordings produced by Bacharach and David.
Without the guidance and tailor-made songwriting that Bacharach/David had provided in the first phase of Warwick's career, it slowed greatly in the 1970s. There were no big hits until 1974's "Then Came You", recorded as a duet with the Spinners and produced by Thom Bell. It was her first US #1 hit on the Billboard Hot 100. Nevertheless, other than this success, Warwick's five years on Warner Bros. Records -- despite the fact that she worked the entire time -- left her almost completely without hits. There were a few quality, but lesser known hits such as "His House and Me" and "Once You Hit The Road" (#79 R&B, #6 Adult Contemporary)-- both of which were produced in 1975 and 1976, respectively, by Thom Bell.
Warwick recorded five albums with Warners: Dionne, produced by Bacharach and David; Just Being Myself, produced by Holland-Dozier-Holland; Then Came You, produced by Jerry Ragavoy; Track of the Cat, produced by Thom Bell; and Love at First Sight, produced by Steve Barri and Michael Omartian. The singer's five-year contract with Warners expired in 1977, and with that, Warwick gladly ended her stay at the label.
This trend ended with the move to a new label and the release of "I'll Never Love This Way Again" in 1979. The song was produced by Barry Manilow. The accompanying album Dionne (1979 Album) (not to be confused with the Warner Bros. album of the same name) was her first to go Platinum. This was her debut on Arista Records, to which she had been personally signed and guided by the label's founder Clive Davis. Her 1980 album, No Night So Long was not quite as strong but featured the quality title track which became a major hit.
In January 1980, while under contract to Arista Records, Dionne Warwick hosted a two-hour TV special called Solid Gold '79. This was adapted into the weekly one-hour show Solid Gold, which she hosted throughout 1980 and again in 1985-86.
After a moderate hit recorded in early 1982 with her friend and fellow musical legend Johnny Mathis -- the Jay Graydon-produced "Friends in Love" -- Warwick's next big hit later that same year was her full-length collaboration with Barry Gibb of The Bee Gees for "Heartbreaker". "Heartbreaker" became one of Dionne's biggest international hits, peaking on Billboard's Hot 100 at #10 in January 1983 and #1 AC in the USA and #2 in the UK. Internationally, the tune was also a smash in continential Europe, Australia, Japan, South Africa, Canada, and Asia. The title track was taken from the album of the same name which sold over 3 million internationally and earned Dionne an RIAA USA gold record award for the album. The album peaked at #25 on the Hot 100 Album Chart, #13 on the R&B Chart and #3 in the UK. Dionne stated to Wesley Hyatt in his The Billboard Book of Number One Adult Contemporary Hits that she was not fond of "Heartbreaker" but recorded the tune because she trusted The Bee Gees' judgment that it would be a hit. The project come about when Clive Davis was attending his aunt's wedding in Florida and spoke with Barry Gibb. Barry mentioned that he had always been a fan of Dionne's and Clive arranged for Dionne and The Bee Gees to discuss a project. Dionne and the brothers Gibb hit it off and the album and the title single were released in October 1982.
In 1983, Dionne released another notable album titled "How Many Times Can We Say Goodbye" which was produced by Luther Vandross. Their collaboration had been a lifelong dream of Vandross, who had maintained that he wanted to work with Warwick, Aretha Franklin, and Diana Ross. The album's most successful single became the beautifully emotive title track, "How Many Times Can Say Goodbye", a duet with Warwick, which despite the production by Vandross, only peaked at #27 on the Billboard Hot 100. The second single, the Dance-pop song "Got a Date", became a moderate hit on the R&B chart. The album only peaked at Number 57 on The Billboard 200 album chart, but it did fare better on the R&B chart. Still, however, it was not as commercially successful as the Heartbreaker album the previous year. Of note, however, was a reunion with The Shirelles on Warwick's cover of "Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow". Warwick would not release another studio album until two years later, 1984's Finder of Lost Loves -- an album that would reunite her with both Barry Manilow and Burt Bacharach, who was now writing with his new lyricist partner and wife, Carole Bayer Sager.
In 1985, Warwick contributed her voice to the Multi-Grammy award winning charity song: We Are the World, along with vocalists like Michael Jackson, Lionel Richie, Tina Turner and Diana Ross.
In 1985, Warwick recorded the American Foundation for AIDS Research (AmFAR) benefit single "That's What Friends Are For" alongside Gladys Knight, Elton John, and Stevie Wonder. The single, credited to "Dionne and Friends" raised over three million dollars for that cause. The tune peaked at #1 for four weeks on the Billboard Hot 100 in January 1986. In 1988, the Washington Post wrote: So working against AIDS, especially after years of raising money for work on many blood-related diseases such as sickle-cell anemia, seemed the right thing to do. "You have to be granite not to want to help people with AIDS, because the devastation that it causes is so painful to see. I was so hurt to see my friend die with such agony," Warwick remembers. "I am tired of hurting and it does hurt." The single won the performers the NARAS Grammy Award for Best Pop Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal, as well as Song of the Year for its writers, Bacharach and Bayer Sager. It also was ranked by Billboard magazine as the most popular song of 1986. With this single, Warwick also released her second most successful album of the decade, titled Friends. The overwhelming success of the title track, however, overshadowed much of the other tracks on the album.
In July 1987, Dionne scored another Billboard Top 20 pop hit (#12) and Top 10 R&B chart hit (and #1 AC hit) with the song, "Love Power", a duet with Jeffrey Osborne. This song, another written by Bacharach and Carole Bayer Sager, was featured in Warwick's album "Reservations for Two". The album's title song, a duet with Kashif, was also a moderate hit. Other artists featured on the album included Smokey Robinson and June Pointer.
Despite the release of another Greatest Hits album -- her first with Arista -- Warwick's career took an unexpected major downturn in the 1990s, with only a few moderate-selling albums released and no major singles. During this period, Warwick became perhaps best known for hosting infomercials for the Psychic Friends Network, a 900 number psychic service.
Warwick's most well-received 1990s album was probably 1993's "Friends Can Be Lovers", which was produced in part by Ian Devaney and Lisa Stansfield. Prominently featured on the album was a tune called "Sunny Weather Lover", which was the first song that Burt Bacharach and Hal David had written together in exactly twenty years from the song's release. It was Warwick's lead single in the US, and was heavily promoted by Arista, but it failed to chart. A follow-up, the steamy, sensual "Where My Lips Have Been" peaked at #95 on the Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Singles & Tracks.
Warwick completed course requirements for her Doctorate of Music Education from the Hartt College of Music in Hartford, Connecticut during the 1990s.
In 2005, Dionne Warwick was honored by Oprah Winfrey at her Legends Ball.
Warwick enjoyed one of her largest audiences ever when she appeared on the May 24, 2006 fifth-season finale of American Idol. 36 million U.S. viewers watched Warwick sing a medley of "Walk on By" and "That's What Friends Are For", with longtime collaborator Burt Bacharach accompanying her on the piano.
In 2006, Warwick -- who was now signed to Concord Records after a fifteen-year tenure at Arista -- released My Friends and Me, a duets album on which she sang with various female singing stars, on thirteen of her old hits. It is her debut album for the label. The album was produced by her son, Damon Elliott. Among her singing partners were Gloria Estefan, Olivia Newton-John, Wynonna Judd and Reba McEntire. The album My Friends & Me peaked at #66 on the Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums chart. Warwick is currently on a world Tour.
On May 5, 2007, Warwick appeared alongside Patti Labelle and performed at the University of Southern Mississippi in a ceremony honoring Mrs. Tena Clark.
According to Billboard Magazine Dionne Warwick is second only to Aretha Franklin as the rock era female vocalist with 56 chart hits.
Dionne appeared as a guest star on the TV Show "So Weird" on The Disney Channel as Effy. She also appeared at "Dionne Berry" in an episode of "Walker, Texas Ranger".
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