Prolific Songster

He’s written hundreds of songs, sold millions of records, earned a Grammy, has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, is a member of the Songwriters Hall of Fame, plus, has a street named after him in his hometown of Brooklyn. Neil Sedaka also has a 7:30 p.m. gig Aug. 8 in the Grandstand Arena at the Ventura County Fair. He probably won’t get lost finding it, since he’s pretty much been everywhere.

“This is my 40th year and I usually go on the road for two weeks a month,” said the singer during a phone interview from Mississippi.

“I’ve had the same musicians for 20 years, and they know all the songs. I was the first American pop singer to go to South America, and I’ve been just about everywhere except for maybe your Hungarys or your Czechoslovakias.”

Sedaka was a child prodigy who has always had an interest in classical music. He started playing piano when he was 8, and a year later attended the Prep School at Juilliard. Around this time, Sedaka’s mom introduced her son to a neighbor named Howard Greenfield. The pair went on to became one of the most successful and prolific songwriting teams of all time.

In those days, the Brill Building in New York was the creative center of the rock ‘n’ roll universe, and that’s where Sedaka and Greenfield contracted with producers Al Nevins and Don Kirschner. They wrote hits for others, and Sedaka sold more than 40 million of his own records, including 25 million between 1958 and 1963.

“We wrote ‘Stupid Cupid’ and ‘Where the Boys Are’ for Connie Francis and got a job at the Brill Building where people like Neil Diamond, Paul Simon and Carole King were working. We went to work every day and wrote songs for eight hours a day.”

Sedaka had one hit after another with such tunes as “Oh! Carol!” (written about Carole King), “Little Devil,” “Stairway to Heaven” (no, not that one), “Calendar Girl,” “Breaking Up Is Hard to Do” and lots more. With the last tune, Sedaka became the only artist to have a hit with two versions of the same song. Back when he was selling tons of records, AM radio was totally cool--listeners could hear a doo-wop song, then perhaps a country song, maybe an instrumental, then a folk song, some surf music and then maybe a Sedaka song.

“I think radio is gradually going back to songs that have melodies. Stuff like acid rock is going away, but songs with melodies will always do well. I grew up listening to the classics,” Sedaka said.

The British Invasion of the late ‘60s finished off many solo performers, but Sedaka resurfaced in the early ‘70s.

He released a couple of albums on Elton John’s label, which featured a pair of No. 1 hits, “Bad Blood” and “Laughter in the Rain.” All the while, Sedaka has continued to tour. With such a lengthy career, Sedaka could play longer than Phish, but he probably won’t.

“I sing songs from four decades from ‘Calendar Girl’ and ‘Breaking Up Is Hard To Do’--both versions,” he said.

“I made a record of classical melodies called ‘Classic Sedaka’ with my own original lyrics. At my shows, I get people who grew up with me and also youngsters who listen to the oldies stations. It’s great to see people enjoying what we’re doing. It’s just happy music.”

The song “Love Will Keep Us Together” was written by Sedaka, but the 1976 Grammy Award-winning version was a hit for Captain & Tennille.

“That song, ‘Love Will Keep Us Together,’ was on one of my albums. I should have released it as a single myself,” he said.

As the writer of more than 1,000 songs, Sedaka knows what a hit should sound like. The artist has sage advice for the would-be tunesmith. “Make demos and start going door to door in New York, Los Angeles or Nashville,” he advised. “Try to figure out what’s popular and try to emulate that.

“Or, then again, sometimes something completely different, something way out of left field like Loreena McKennitt will work. So I would say, go with the flow or else go completely against it.”

At 58, things are going well for Sedaka. He has lost 40 pounds and is a shadow of his former self. So what’s that most misunderstood thing about Neil Sedaka?

“Maybe that I’m a goody two shoes,” said the singer. When asked to describe some rotten act he perpetrated, he declined to elaborate. Sedaka, however, was once fired by the Carpenters, and he recalls an incident in Italy.

“I used to rerecord my albums in other languages such as Spanish, Hebrew and Italian,” he said. “In Italy, I was billed as “The voice that makes you dream.” Anyway, I was doing this concert there and I had laryngitis, and I couldn’t last longer than 30 minutes, so they threw tomatoes at me.”