Don Kirshner biography to publish

In 1958, Don Kirshner was a 23-year-old kid with little more than dream in his pocket. By 1960, he had built one of the most powerful new publishing houses in the music business and was well on his way to reshaping pop music.



Next March, Hal Leonard Books will publish Don Kirshner: The Man with the Golden Ear (March 13, 2012; Hal Leonard Books; $19.99) by Rich Podolsky, a biography of the one-of-a-kind rock ‘n’ roll prodigy and pioneer, who died in January at the age of 76. Tony Orlando has written the foreword.



By 1960, at the ripe old age of 25, he was well on his way to becoming the guy that Time Magazine christened, "The Man With the Golden Ear." In five short years, he built the song publishing firm Aldon Music from scratch and coaxed and guided his stable of teenage phenoms, including Bobby Darin, Carole King, and Neil Sedaka, to write more than 200 hits. And many turned out to be much more than hits, as it turned out; they became standards – including “On Broadway,” “Will You Love Me Tomorrow,” “Up on the Roof,” “Breaking Up Is Hard to Do,” “I Love How You Love Me,” “Who Put the Bomp,” and “The Locomotion” – songs that have become the soundtrack of a generation.



Kirshner went on to develop the Monkees, commissioning songs for them from some of his best Aldon Music writers, including Neil Diamond and King, and create the cartoon band The Archies, whose “Sugar, Sugar” was the best-selling song of 1969. In 1973, he brought live (not lip-synched) rock ‘n’ roll to television with his groundbreaking late-night series Don Kirshner’s Rock Concert.



Don Kirshner: The Man with the Golden Ear is the story of the star maker and hit maker who helped chart the course of rock ‘n’ roll for decades.



ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Rich Podolsky, an established reporter and writer since the 1970s, has been a staff writer for CBS, and has written for TV Guide, ESPN, the Philadelphia Daily News, the Palm Beach Post, and the Wilmington News Journal. He lives in New York.



March 13, 2012 $19.99 Paperback Original 978-1-45841-656-8 304 pages 6" x 9"

Hal Leonard Books is an imprint of Hal Leonard Performing Arts Publishing Group