Songwriters Hall

The Songwriters Hall of Fame hosted a preview of a new exhibit devoted to songwriters at the Grammy Museum in Los Angeles on Wednesday April 26. At least nine SHOF inductees were present, including Charles Fox, Steve Dorff, Jimmy Jam, Holly Knight, Billy Steinberg, Rick Nowels, Mike Stoller, Jimmy Webb and Diane Warren.

The exhibit, which occupies an entire floor of the Grammy Museum, has a treasure trove of artifacts and memorabilia on display. Linda Moran, president and CEO of the SHOF, personally twisted arms to get songwriters, or their families, to loan out prized items.

One display case focuses on recipients of the Hal David Starlight Award, which goes to current writers at the peak of their game, who have not yet been inducted into the SHOF (but in many cases, probably will be). This brought in memorabilia by such younger writers as John Legend, Taylor Swift, Benny Blanco, Ne-Yo and Dan Reynolds (Imagine Dragons).

A mural on a side wall captured historical music moments from 1828 to the present. The oldest entries included Stephen Foster writing “Oh! Susanna” (1847), Thomas Edison inventing the phonograph (1877), the first issue of Billboard (1894) and Scott Joplin publishing “Maple Leaf Rag” (1899).  The newest entries included the launch of YouTube (2005), the debut of the iPhone (2007), Jay-Z becoming the first hip-hop artist in the SHOF (2017) and the spate of catalog sales by such top songwriters as Bob Dylan and Bruce Springsteen (the 2020s).   

Here are eight items showcased in the exhibit that especially caught our eye.

Jimmy Webb’s Rhyming Dictionary

Image Credit: Jack Robinson/GI

Jimmy Webb, the prodigy who wrote such ’60s classics as “By the Time I Get to Phoenix,” “Up, Up and Away,” “MacArthur Park,” “Wichita Lineman” and “Galveston” (all before turning 23) loaned his copy of The Complete Rhyming Dictionary, revised and edited by Clement Wood. Webb’s exhibit case also included his handwritten lyrics for “Wichita Lineman,” which includes one of the best lyrics ever written, “And I need you more than want you/ And I want you for all time.” If a rhyming dictionary can help you write like that, every songwriter should have one.

Irving Berlin’s “trick” piano

The exhibit’s most prized artifact — one so special it had not one, but two, velvet rope barriers around it to keep fans at a distance — was Irving Berlin’s console-spinet piano and piano bench (made by Sohmer & Co, New York). It’s a beaut, in gorgeous maple wood and in pristine condition. Berlin gifted it to his friend, actor Sidney Miller in 1957.

A card in the exhibit explains that “Berlin was a self-taught pianist who didn’t read music. He owned what he called his trick piano, a rarity featuring a mechanism that allowed him to shift into different keys.”

One of Berlin’s most famous hits was “I Love a Piano” (1916). Many of the attendees loved this piano.

Lyrics written by Taylor Swift on paper that reflected her changing circumstances

The exhibit included Taylor Swift’s handwritten lyrics to her first hit, 2006’s “Tim McGraw” — written, appropriately, on a sheet of lined notebook paper. Swift and Liz Rose penned the song during her freshman year at Hendersonville High School. She conceived the idea for the song during a math class, so notebook paper was at the ready.

The exhibit also included her handwritten lyrics to “Run (Taylor’s Version),” which she co-wrote with Aaron Dessner and which appeared on her 2021 album Red (Taylor’s Version). This time the lyrics were written on six pages of a note pad from The Ritz Carlton. You wouldn’t expect one of the most successful artists of all time to stay at a Motel 6, would you?

A letter from Irving Berlin to Johnny Mercer

The Mercer display included a typed letter that Irving Berlin sent to him on June 1, 1971. Berlin wrote that he was enclosing a copy of a menu for a songwriters’ dinner before World War I. “Those were the days before the Oscar, the Emmy, the Grammy, the Toni [sic] and the Halls of Fame. The only award the songwriter of a hit song could get was a royalty statement – with check – and the praise or envy of his fellow songwriters. Sometimes the envy was valued more than the praise. With my best to you, As always, Irving.”

Mercer was a four-time Oscar winner for best original song — but even for someone like him, a letter from Irving Berlin, one of the greatest songwriters who ever lived, was a keeper.

A telegram from Pat Benatar to Holly Knight

Back in the dim and distant past — before texts, before email — if you really wanted to communicate quickly with someone, you sent a Western Union telegram. On the night of Feb. 28, 1984, upon winning a Grammy for best rock performance, female for her early MTV-era classic “Love Is a Battlefield,” Pat Benatar sent a telegram to Holly Knight (who co-wrote the song with Mike Chapman), with this nice message: “Congratulations and thank you for such a beautiful song to work with.”

Benatar was right, of course — artists always need great songs. But Benatar had a little something to do with it, too: That was the fourth consecutive year that she won in that category.

A cassette demo of the 1986 Cyndi Lauper smash “True Colors”

Billy Steinberg was represented by a cassette demo for “True Colors,” which he co-wrote with Tom Kelly and recorded on a TDK SA 60 cassette. The exhibit also includes the sheet music for the song, which became Lauper’s second No. 1 hit on the Billboard Hot 100. (The price listed on the front of the sheet music: “$2.95 in the USA” – prices have gone up in the past 37 years.) And it includes a nice note from Lauper to Steinberg: “Billy—Thanks for sending me and writing such a beautiful song. (heart) Cyndi.”

Another exhibit included typed lyrics with handwritten tweaks to “Like a Virgin” – another song written by Steinberg and Kelly. The lyrics were dated September 1983, a full year before Madonna performed the song on the 1984 MTV Video Music Awards and became the talk of the music world overnight.

Allee Willis’ unique percussion instruments

Willis, who co-wrote such hits as Earth, Wind & Fire’s “September” and The Rembrandts’ “I’ll Be There for You” (which will forever be known as the theme song from Friends), was represented by unique percussion instruments that she used on her demos. They included a battered, empty soda pop can (Vernon’s ginger ale) on a stick and an old-fashioned washboard.

The washboard was used for the demo that Willis, Brenda Russell and Stephen Bray made for the theatrical adaptation of The Color Purple, which was workshopped in Atlanta in the summer of 2004 before opening on Broadway the following year.   

Sammy Cahn’s “traveling typewriter”

Cahn — who, like Mercer, won four Oscars for best original song — was represented by his “traveling typewriter,” in a vintage metallic suitcase. (The set designer for Mad Men would have killed for it.) Cahn included a note saying the SHOF would probably receive many typewriters for a future exhibit (this exhibit had been in the works for years). Now, of course, few songwriters write on typewriters. A future SHOF exhibit will presumably include a lot of iPhones.