Macaulay, Tony (21st April 1944-Present)

He is a songwriter, composer, producer and author born Anthony Gordon Instone in Fulham, London, England who started out as a song plugger promoting songs and music for Essex Publishing in the early 1960s.

After moving to Pye Records as a record producer in the mid-’60s he saw his first success when he co-wrote “Baby Now That I’ve Found You” with John MacLeod which was recorded by The Foundations and became No. 1 in the UK chart. Other hit songs he wrote in collaboration with others include “Love Grows (Where My Rosemary Goes)” by Edison Lighthouse, “Build Me Up Buttercup” by The Foundations, Sorry Suzanne” by The Hollies, “Let the Heartaches Begin” by Long John Baldry, “You Won’t Find Another Fool Like Me” by The New Seekers, “That Same Old Feeling” by Pickettywitch.

Hit songs he wrote by himself include “(Last Night) I Didn’t Get to Sleep At All” by The 5th Dimension, “Baby Make It Soon” and “Falling Apart at the Seams” by The Marmalade, “Don’t Give Up On Us” by David Soul and “Can’t We Just Sit Down (And Talk It Over)” by Donna Summer.

His hit songs written alone or in collaboration number 38 top 20 singles, 8 reaching No. 1, in the UK and 16, including 3 reaching No. 1, in the USA. He became the first “Songwriter of the Year” award winner from the British Academy in 1970 and won it again in 1977. He has now won 9 British Academy Awards and is the first winner, born outside the USA, of the Edwin Forrest Award for outstanding services to the theatre. It has been acknowledge that he is “one of the greatest songwriters of all time” and is a past chairman of the Society of Distinguished Songwriters

After winning a legal case in 1974 where he had been involved in a dispute with his publishers during the early 1970s, he led the way for other artists to also double-check their contracts and challenge them if necessary. This lost his interest in writing pop songs and decided to turn his interest to writing for the stage.

As a composer he first collaborated on writing for musical theatre with Ken Hill who was the playwright of Is Your Doctor Really Necessary? and Gentlemen Prefer Anything in 1973 and 1974 respectively. He went on to write the scores for The Beast in the Cellar, Percy’s Progress and Windy City and working on films he was the music co-ordinator for 1975’s Never Too Young to Rock. He has written for many stage musicals during his career with Sherlock in Love being his tenth production performed in the United States in 2015.

He was Composer to her Majesty the Queen when he was picked to write music for her sixtieth birthday celebrations.

Outside of music he decided to start writing thrillers in the mid-’90s with his first publication being Sayonara. His second novel was Enemy of the State and led him to starting a thriller-writing course held at Brighton University.

The Marmalade recordings
Falling Apart at the Seams (Tony Macaulay)
Target (TGT 105) UK single

Sources:

Macaulay, Tony (21st April 1944-Present)

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