Get ready for a night with Barry Manilow

On June 17, Barry Alan Pincus will be blowing out 80 candles on his birthday cake.

He is, of course, better known as legendary singer-songwriter Barry Manilow who, as a solo artist, has sold more than 85 million records worldwide, released 13 platinum and six multi-platinum albums and, over the course of his 59-year career, has worked with everyone from Bette Midler and Dick Clark to Dionne Warwick and Nancy Wilson.

He changed his name to Manilow, his mother’s maiden name, at his Bar Mitzvah, and his career in the music business began in 1964 when, aged 21, Barry composed an entire score for a musical adaptation of the melodrama The Drunkard. He was originally asked to arrange some songs by CBS director Bro Herrod; the Off Broadway musical subsequently enjoyed an eight-year run.

The Sixties also saw Barry work as a commercial jingle writer and singer for brands such as McDonald’s, Band-Aid and Pepsi, as well as working on music for TV projects. By the end of the decade, he and a group of other session musicians were given a recording contract under the band name Featherbed.

While they didn’t set the charts on fire, in 1971, everything changed when Bette Midler hired Barry as her pianist and later as producer on the albums The Divine Miss M and Bette Midler. They would work together until 1975.

However, in 1973, Barry released his debut, self-titled album, whose songs included a slower version of what was originally a hit for Donna Summer and would go on to become a Manilow classic: Could it Be Magic.

The year after, the singer hit the big time with the single Mandy from his second album, the imaginatively titled Barry Manilow II. It led to an unbroken string of hit singles and albums running through to the early 1980s.

Although music critics never really embraced Barry’s work with quite the same enthusiasm as his army of followers, he has become a global icon, feted by fans who did not desert him as he’d feared when he came out in April 2017, as well as a host of artists with whom he worked as a producer.

As recently as 2021, Barry was still wowing the crowds as a live performer with his The Hits Come Home residency in Las Vegas.

What better reason to celebrate his legacy than with an evening of programmes dedicated to him? It begins with a look back at some of Barry’s best archive performances for Auntie Beeb, with clips from Top of the Pops and Parkinson, as well as highlights of the star’s 1983 concert at Blenheim Palace.

The celebrations continue with One Night with Barry Manilow, his 2004 concert packed with evergreen hits such as I Write the Songs and Can’t Smile Without You, as well as contributions from fans, who explain why his music has retained its appeal across seven decades.

Following a break for Later… with Jools Holland, there’s a chance to see Barry Manilow at the NEC 1989 before the curtain comes down on an evening of toe-tapping music and dazzling dance with Barry Manilow at Proms in Hyde Park, a 2019 gig in which he was backed by the BBC Concert Orchestra.