Don Kirshner, ‘The Man with the Golden Ear,’ Dies
Man! I remember staying up late to see the biggest stars of music hit the stage to perform!!
Don Kirshner, the ’60s music publisher behind the music of The Monkees and many others, died on Monday of heart failure. He was 76.
Kirshner discovered Bobby Darin in the ’50s and began Aldon Music with Al Nevins, creating a veritable songwriting factory in the Brill Building in New York City. Kirshner’s writers included Carole King, Neil Sedaka, Howard Greenfield, Cynthia Weil and Barry Mann. He used many of those writers to provide the hit music for the TV show The Monkees. Time magazine called him, “The Man with the Golden Ear.”
When The Monkees became a real group and started writing their own material, Kirshner moved on to a less problematic project, The Archies, a cartoon group who had a worldwide hit with “Sugar, Sugar.” In the ’70s Kirshner developed and hosted his own weekly music show, Don Kirshner’s Rock Concert.
He was inducted into the Songwriter’s Hall of Fame in 2007.
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