b. 3 July 1937, Buffalo, New York, USA. A prolific composer for films, television and the stage, Shire studied piano as a youngster, and played in his father's dance band at local functions. While at Yale he majored in music, and wrote two musicals with Richard Maltby Jnr., Cyrano and Grand Tour. He subsequently studied briefly at Brandeis University where he was the first recipient of the Eddie Fisher Fellowship Award. In 1961, again with Maltby, Shire wrote some songs for the off-Broadway revue Sap Of Life, and the new team also had two of their numbers, "Autumn" and "No More Songs For Me', recorded by the up-and-coming Barbra Streisand. This led to Shire spending nearly two years playing piano in the orchestra pit for Funny Girl, and serving as assistant arranger on Streisand's early television specials. In the late 60s, after his stage musical Love Match failed to reach Broadway, Shire began to write the scores for popular television programmes such as The Virginian, and eventually moved out to Hollywood in 1969. The majority of his more than 40 feature film scores - for a wide variety of genre such as westerns, comedies, thrillers, melodramas and love stories - were written in the 70s, and included One More Train To Rob (1971), The Taking Of Pelham 123 (1974), Summertree, Skin Game, Drive, He Said, Two People, Showdown, Class Of '44, The Conversation, Farewell, My Lovely, The Hindenburg, All The President's Men, The Big Bus, Saturday Night Fever, Straight Time, and Norma Rae (1979). Throughout the 80s and early 90s he continued to write the background music for movies such as Only When I Laugh (1981), The Night The Lights Went Out In Georgia, Paternity, Max Dugan Returns, Oh, God! You Devil, 2010, Return To Oz, Short Circuit, "Night Mother, Backfire, Vice Versa, Monkey Shines, Paris Trout, Bed And Breakfast, Texan, One Night Stand, and I Married A Monster From Outer Space (1998). Shire has also scored numerous television films, and miniseries such as Echoes In The Darkness (1987), The Women Of Brewster Place (1989), and The Kennedys Of Massachusetts, Heartbeat, Remember, Once In A Lifetime, Reunion, Jake's Women, Heidi, Almost Golden: The Jessica Savitch Story, Streets Of Laredo, Alone, and Ms. Scrooge (1997). In 1979 he won an Oscar for the song "It Goes Like It Goes" (lyric by Norman Gimbel) which was sung on the soundtrack of the film Norma Rae by Jennifer Warnes. He was also awarded two Grammys for his contributions to the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack album. As well as Streisand, his songs have been recorded by numerous other artists, including Johnny Mathis, Melissa Manchester, and Judy Collins, and he has had several US chart successes, including "Washington Square" (written with Bob Goldstein, and a US number 2 in 1963 for the Dixieland-styled band, the Village Stompers), and "With You I'm Born Again" (lyric by Carol Connors), an international hit in 1980 for Billy Preston and Syreeta. Shire has also composed songs and incidental music for Joseph Papp's New York Shakespeare Festival Theatre, and other acclaimed theatrical productions. He was married for a time to actress Talia Shire, the sister of director Francis Ford Coppola, and star of several Rocky movies.

Listen to David Shire at Finetune.

• Night On Disco Mountain
• Manhattan Skyline
• Night on Disco Mountain (Based on Night on Bald Mountain)
• Salsation

• Bee Gees
• Yvonne Elliman
• Abba
• KC & The Sunshine Band
• Michael Jackson
• Queen
• The Trammps
• Donna Summer
• Electric Light Orchestra
• Kool & the Gang
• Earth, Wind & Fire
• Chic
• Gloria Gaynor
• Diana Ross
• Silver Convention
• Walter Murphy
• Stevie Wonder
• Odyssey
• Barry White
• Billy Joel