Burt Bacharach obituary: The king of easy-listening pop

Songwriter whose hits, including 'I Say a Little Prayer' and 'Walk on By', became classics of easy-listening pop

 Burt Bacharach attends the 2016 Newport Beach Film Festival Honors in Newport Beach, Californiain 2016. The Grammy, Oscar, and Tony-winning Bacharach died on Wednesday at home in Los Angeles of natural causes. He was 94.

Few songwriters have been able to enjoy hits across six decades, as well as the bonus of a dramatic revival of interest in their work during the later years of their careers. Burt Bacharach, who has died aged 94, could claim both.

With his writing partner Hal David, Bacharach launched himself into the front rank of pop songwriters with a brilliant streak of hits for Dionne Warwick during the 1960s, beginning in 1962 with 'Don’t Make Me Over' and proceeding through (among others) 'Walk on By', 'Anyone Who Had a Heart', 'I Say a Little Prayer', and 'Do You Know the Way to San Jose'. All became standards in Bacharach’s chosen pop-easy-listening genre, their apparent simplicity concealing his mastery of different rhythms and metres.