Hal David, ‘Raindrops Keep Fallin’’ songwriter, dies at 91

Hal David, a lyricist who along with composer Burt Bacharach took the pop world by storm in the 1960s with hits such as Raindrops Keep Fallin’ on my Head and Walk on By, died in Los Angeles on Saturday at age 91, a representative said.

David died at Cedars-Sinai Medical Centre of complications from a stroke, said Jim Steinblatt, spokesman for the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP).

Earlier this year, David and Bacharach received the Gershwin Prize for Popular Song from the Library of Congress, during a White House musical tribute.

David, a native of Brooklyn, New York, began his songwriting career in the late 1940s by collabourating with writers he had met at Manhattan’s famed Brill Building, which at the time was the centre of the pop industry.

He started working with Bacharach in the late 1950s and their songs were recorded by such artists as Frank Sinatra, Marty Robbins, Tom Jones and Barbra Streisand.

The singer most associated with the songwriting duo is Dionne Warwick, who rose to fame by scoring a number of Top 10 hits in the 1960s with material from David and Bacharach.

Bacharach’s and David’s song Raindrops Keep Fallin’ on my Head was written for the 1969 movie Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid and won the Academy Award for Best Song.