Rock and pop hitmaker Jim Steinman, who wrote and composed music for Meat Loaf, Bonnie Tyler, Celine Dion and more, died Monday, April 19. He was 73.
The chief medical examiner’s office in Connecticut confirmed Steinman’s death Rolling stoneNo cause of death was given.
A statement on Steinman’s Facebook page said, “With a heavy heart I can confirm Jim’s passing. There will be much more to say in the coming hours and days as we prepare to honor this giant of a human and his glorious legacy. For now, do something that will make you feel young, happy, and free. He would like to have that for you! “
Throughout Steinman’s entirely unique career, he worked as a composer, lyricist and producer for a range of artists in a variety of styles. According to a biography on his website, the records he has worked on have sold more than 190 million copies worldwide. He was also nominated for four Grammys over the course of his career, eventually winning Album of the Year for his work on Dion’s 1996 hit, Fall into you
Steinman started his career in musical theater, writing and performing in a rock musical while in college calling The dream bike, which caught the attention of New York theatrical producer Joe Papp. After graduation, Steinman worked at the Public Theater in New York (which Papp founded) and juggled various creative projects. In 1973, Yvonne Elliman recorded Steinman’s song “Happy Ending,” which became Steinman’s first commercially released tune. That same year, the Public Theater hosted his musical More than you deserve
One of the actors auditioned for More than you deserve was Meat Loaf, and he and Steinman soon developed a close personal and professional relationship. The two began work on Meat Loaf’s actual solo debut, Bat from hell, in the early 1970s, but the album would not be released until 1977. Not until about a year later – after Meat Loaf performed on Saturday Night Live – that the album became a certified hit.
“There is no other songwriter like him ever,” Meat Loaf said during Steinman’s induction into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2012. “I can never pay him back. He has had such a big impact on my life, and I learned so much from him that I could never repay Mr. Jim Steinman. “
Despite the success of Bat from hellHowever, the relationship between Meat Loaf and Steinman began to fray after Steinman began working on a sequel with Bruce Springsteen’s keyboardist Roy Bittan without telling Meat Loaf. Although they have been completed and released Dead ringtone In 1981 Steinman and Meat Loaf worked together much more sporadically, and they were often involved in lawsuits against each other.
In the 1980s, Steinman worked with Barbra Streisand, the Sisters of Mercy and Fire Inc. He produced Bonnie Tyler records, including 1983’s Faster than the speed of light (featuring the hit “Total Eclipse of the Heart” written by Steinman) and from 1986 Secret dreams and forbidden fire; he composed the theme music for professional wrestler Hulk Hogan; and he wrote “Holding Out for a Hero” for the Footloose soundtrack (sung by Tyler). Meat Loaf also recorded a handful of Steinman songs for 1984’s Bad attitude, while Steinman released the album in 1989 Original without with his group Pandora’s Box.
In the early 1990s, Meat Loaf and Steinman reunited, and released them in 1993 Bat Out of Hell II: Back Into Hell, with the hit ‘I’ll Do Anything for Love (But I Won’t Do That)’. A few years later, Steinman joined Dion and produced Fall into you and writing her hit ‘It’s All Coming Back to Me Now’. Steinman also took on several music theater projects in the 1990s, in collaboration with Andrew Lloyd Webber Whistle in the wind and create his own project, dance of the vampires, which opened in Austria in 1997.
Meat Loaf was released in 2006 Bat Out of Hell III: The Monster Is Loose, which was credited and promoted as another production with Steinman, but the pair again became embroiled in a legal dispute and worked sparsely on it (in an interview with Rolling stone, Meat Loaf admitted that the album “should never have happened” saying, “For me, that record doesn’t exist.”) But the pair once again conquered their differences, and in 2016 they released what would be their last album together, Braver than we are
“My songs are anthems,” said Steinman Rolling stone in 1978, “to those moments when you feel like you are at the head of a burning match. They are folk songs on the essence of rock & roll, a world that despises idleness and loves passion and rebellion. They’re folk songs to the kind of feeling you get when listening to the Ronettes’ Be My Baby. That’s what I love about anthems – the anger, the melody, and the passion. “