Burt Bacharach's first wife Paula Stewart describes him as a "neat nut" and a "germ freak", but in the prologue of his new autobiography, Anyone Who Had a Heart, it's moving to read how Bacharach's obsessive compulsive disorder manifests itself in emotionally testing circumstances.
It's July 1966 and his second wife, the actress Angie Dickinson, has just given birth to their daughter Nikki. Sadly, the baby is premature and only weighs one pound, ten ounces. "Day after day I would stand looking at my tiny little doll of a daughter in her incubator," writes Bacharach. Fearing she will die if he skips the ritual, he sings the McCoys' Hang on Sloopy to her during every single visit.
As readers, we immediately feel we've grasped the tenor of the book, but this memoir transpires to be much more than a sentimental journey lathering the life of a man synonymous with easy-listening music. A classic "warts and all" autobiography, it is in fact admirably honest. It's also surprising just how much quote space Bacharach grants his three ex-wives, women who knock pretty much everything about him bar his good looks and musical gift - though not, we learn, without some justification.
Songwriter and sometime Bacharach foil Elvis Costello notes that, even in 2001, when Burt was already 73, the Kansas City-born, New York City-raised composer's attractiveness still rendered other males in the room "invisible" when he was presented with the Polar Music Prize in Sweden. It's Liverpudlian star Cilla Black, though, who best captures the love-hate feelings that Burt sometimes invoked in women. Recalling the arduous Abbey Road recording session for Alfie, during which the perfectionist Bacharach pushed her to sing 29 takes, Black says: "I wanted to [expletive deleted] kill him but he was so [expletive deleted] gorgeous."
Burt and his co-author Robert Greenfield deal with the pre-fame years quickly but effectively: Bacharach was a lonely child despite his mother nicknaming him "Happy"; he once met Leonard Bernstein on a bus; the insomnia that has continued to plague him began in childhood, and he disliked piano lessons as much as most eight-year-olds.
Undaunted, his parents bought him a Steinway anyway, and Bacharach says it was Jewish guilt that propelled him beyond dry music theory, and on to a precociously sophisticated appreciation for the music of Dizzy Gillespie, Debussy and Ravel.
One of the book's most vivid chapters concerns his time in the employ of Marlene Dietrich. Prior to fully cementing his name as a composer, Bacharach was her musical director and toured the world with the German-American actress and singer in the late 1950s. Dietrich was some 25 years his senior, and their relationship remained platonic. She could be jealously possessive of him, however. Indeed, Bacharach maintains that, in 1965, when he was about to marry Angie Dickinson, Dietrich stuck pins in voodoo doll effigies of his fiancee.
Naturally, there's also plenty here about Hal David, the deft but un-showy lyricist that Bacharach first met at the Brill Building in 1957, and with whom he wrote Raindrops Keep Fallin' on My Head, I Say a Little Prayer, and sundry other pop standards. For Angie Dickinson and others, the pair were chalk and cheese, hence she paints David as an old-fashioned, slightly dowdy character who was ill at ease in showbiz, and Bacharach as a hip and dynamic "forever young" type.
That the music of Bacharach, partly the inspiration for Mike Myers' fictional swinger Austin Powers, outshone that of the quietly capable Hal was inevitable, and so too, perhaps, were the ructions that ensued over royalty splits and their respective media profiles. To his credit, Burt takes the blame for the 10-year fall-out with Hal that was kick-started by Burt reneging on his commitment to produce another Bacharach and David-penned album with their most celebrated mouthpiece, Dionne Warwick, but elsewhere, when Burt says "Hey, nobody whistles lyrics, you know?", it seems a dig at David.
Towards the end of the book, Bacharach gives his partner his due, though, and he writes movingly about how the stroke Hal David suffered six weeks before they won the 2012 Gershwin Prize for Popular Song prevents the lyricist from attending the ceremony. When David later dies on September 1, 2012 at the age of 91, Bacharach writes a tribute for the Los Angeles Times.
Throughout the book, we gain insights into Bacharach's music. It was one of his composition teachers, Darius Milhaud, who told Burt: "Never be ashamed to write a tune you can whistle", but though pop was his chosen idiom, Bacharach grew to be a highly sophisticated composer of some harmonic and rhythmic complexity.
"The plain C major chord just seemed so vanilla to me," he says at one point, while Frank Sinatra - mindful of the irregular, three, then four-bar Bacharach phrases that A&R men would routinely baulk at - has a joke for a Vegas crowd that includes Burt: "There's a man in the audience who's a good composer", says Ol' Blue Eyes. "He writes in hat sizes. Seven and three-fourths."
That "good" should have been "great", of course, and if Sinatra was damning Bacharach with faint praise, Anyone Who Had a Heart reveals why. Sometime rivals for the affections of the fabulously named dancer Slim Brandy, the two men had history, but Sinatra undoubtedly rated Bacharach, and in the late 1960s he even telephoned him to request they make an album together. By Bacharach's account, things soured when he didn't bite Sinatra's hand off: "I said, 'Right now I'm in rehearsal for [Broadway musical] Promises, Promises …' I didn't even get to finish the sentence before Frank said, 'Forget it, man. Just forget it.'"
And so a life less ordinary rolls on. We read that This Guy's in Love With You, described by Oasis's Noel Gallagher as "the best love song ever", only came out of mothballs when Herb Alpert inquired what Bacharach and David had in their bottom drawer. We learn of Laura Bush and Cherie Blair singing Burt's songs to him at a charity bash in Dallas, and of the party that Bacharach's third wife, songwriter Carole Bayer Sager, throws for Elizabeth Taylor (Burt ends up jamming with Bob Dylan).
These titbits help flag up Bacharach and David's enduring impact as popular songwriters, but Burt's personal life is certainly not without its shadows. When his mother Irma dies in 1987 and he spends days finishing a song he's writing for the movie Baby Boom instead of immediately flying to New York, we're reminded that nothing comes between Burt and his music.
It's sad, too, to read that his daughter Nikki grew up to be a deeply troubled young women whose Asperger's syndrome wasn't diagnosed until she was 34, and who took her own life in 2007, at the age of 40. Somewhat estranged from her for many years, Bacharach responds by writing a tribute instrumental, Nikki, and Hal David, who else, later writes some touching lyrics.
Bacharach seems grateful for Noel Gallagher's props and his own cameo in 1997's Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery, both of which helped reboot his career, but much more precious to him, you sense, is the sheet music for George and Ira Gershwin's 1927 song Strike Up the Band that was gifted to him by Ira Gershwin himself. Part of the inscription reads: "For Burt - The Fifth B - (in no particular order) - Beethoven, Brahms, Berlin, Bach & Bacharach." High praise indeed, and something for Burt to brandish when fools dismiss his work as muzak.
James McNair writes for Mojo magazine and The Independent.
thereview@thenational.ae
Test
Director: S Sashikanth
Cast: Nayanthara, Siddharth, Meera Jasmine, R Madhavan
Star rating: 2/5
The specs
Engine: Four electric motors, one at each wheel
Power: 579hp
Torque: 859Nm
Transmission: Single-speed automatic
Price: From Dh825,900
On sale: Now
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The National's picks
4.35pm: Tilal Al Khalediah
5.10pm: Continous
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Details
Through Her Lens: The stories behind the photography of Eva Sereny
Forewords by Jacqueline Bisset and Charlotte Rampling, ACC Art Books
Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
US%20federal%20gun%20reform%20since%20Sandy%20Hook
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2025 Fifa Club World Cup groups
Group A: Palmeiras, Porto, Al Ahly, Inter Miami.
Group B: Paris Saint-Germain, Atletico Madrid, Botafogo, Seattle.
Group C: Bayern Munich, Auckland City, Boca Juniors, Benfica.
Group D: Flamengo, ES Tunis, Chelsea, (Leon banned).
Group E: River Plate, Urawa, Monterrey, Inter Milan.
Group F: Fluminense, Borussia Dortmund, Ulsan, Mamelodi Sundowns.
Group G: Manchester City, Wydad, Al Ain, Juventus.
Group H: Real Madrid, Al Hilal, Pachuca, Salzburg.
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Formula Middle East Calendar (Formula Regional and Formula 4)
Round 1: January 17-19, Yas Marina Circuit – Abu Dhabi
Round 2: January 22-23, Yas Marina Circuit – Abu Dhabi
Round 3: February 7-9, Dubai Autodrome – Dubai
Round 4: February 14-16, Yas Marina Circuit – Abu Dhabi
Round 5: February 25-27, Jeddah Corniche Circuit – Saudi Arabia
What can you do?
Document everything immediately; including dates, times, locations and witnesses
Seek professional advice from a legal expert
You can report an incident to HR or an immediate supervisor
You can use the Ministry of Human Resources and Emiratisation’s dedicated hotline
In criminal cases, you can contact the police for additional support
The smuggler
Eldarir had arrived at JFK in January 2020 with three suitcases, containing goods he valued at $300, when he was directed to a search area.
Officers found 41 gold artefacts among the bags, including amulets from a funerary set which prepared the deceased for the afterlife.
Also found was a cartouche of a Ptolemaic king on a relief that was originally part of a royal building or temple.
The largest single group of items found in Eldarir’s cases were 400 shabtis, or figurines.
Khouli conviction
Khouli smuggled items into the US by making false declarations to customs about the country of origin and value of the items.
According to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, he provided “false provenances which stated that [two] Egyptian antiquities were part of a collection assembled by Khouli's father in Israel in the 1960s” when in fact “Khouli acquired the Egyptian antiquities from other dealers”.
He was sentenced to one year of probation, six months of home confinement and 200 hours of community service in 2012 after admitting buying and smuggling Egyptian antiquities, including coffins, funerary boats and limestone figures.
For sale
A number of other items said to come from the collection of Ezeldeen Taha Eldarir are currently or recently for sale.
Their provenance is described in near identical terms as the British Museum shabti: bought from Salahaddin Sirmali, "authenticated and appraised" by Hossen Rashed, then imported to the US in 1948.
- An Egyptian Mummy mask dating from 700BC-30BC, is on offer for £11,807 ($15,275) online by a seller in Mexico
- A coffin lid dating back to 664BC-332BC was offered for sale by a Colorado-based art dealer, with a starting price of $65,000
- A shabti that was on sale through a Chicago-based coin dealer, dating from 1567BC-1085BC, is up for $1,950
Director: Shady Ali
Cast: Boumi Fouad , Mohamed Tharout and Hisham Ismael
Rating: 3/5
Dubai Bling season three
Cast: Loujain Adada, Zeina Khoury, Farhana Bodi, Ebraheem Al Samadi, Mona Kattan, and couples Safa & Fahad Siddiqui and DJ Bliss & Danya Mohammed
Rating: 1/5
The BIO:
He became the first Emirati to climb Mount Everest in 2011, from the south section in Nepal
He ascended Mount Everest the next year from the more treacherous north Tibetan side
By 2015, he had completed the Explorers Grand Slam
Last year, he conquered K2, the world’s second-highest mountain located on the Pakistan-Chinese border
He carries dried camel meat, dried dates and a wheat mixture for the final summit push
His new goal is to climb 14 peaks that are more than 8,000 metres above sea level
At a glance
Global events: Much of the UK’s economic woes were blamed on “increased global uncertainty”, which can be interpreted as the economic impact of the Ukraine war and the uncertainty over Donald Trump’s tariffs.
Growth forecasts: Cut for 2025 from 2 per cent to 1 per cent. The OBR watchdog also estimated inflation will average 3.2 per cent this year
Welfare: Universal credit health element cut by 50 per cent and frozen for new claimants, building on cuts to the disability and incapacity bill set out earlier this month
Spending cuts: Overall day-to day-spending across government cut by £6.1bn in 2029-30
Tax evasion: Steps to crack down on tax evasion to raise “£6.5bn per year” for the public purse
Defence: New high-tech weaponry, upgrading HM Naval Base in Portsmouth
Housing: Housebuilding to reach its highest in 40 years, with planning reforms helping generate an extra £3.4bn for public finances
UPI facts
More than 2.2 million Indian tourists arrived in UAE in 2023
More than 3.5 million Indians reside in UAE
Indian tourists can make purchases in UAE using rupee accounts in India through QR-code-based UPI real-time payment systems
Indian residents in UAE can use their non-resident NRO and NRE accounts held in Indian banks linked to a UAE mobile number for UPI transactions
The specs
Engine: Long-range single or dual motor with 200kW or 400kW battery
Transmission: Single-speed automatic
Max touring range: 620km / 590km
Price: From Dh250,000 (estimated)
Profile of Bitex UAE
Date of launch: November 2018
Founder: Monark Modi
Based: Business Bay, Dubai
Sector: Financial services
Size: Eight employees
Investors: Self-funded to date with $1m of personal savings
Key facilities
- Olympic-size swimming pool with a split bulkhead for multi-use configurations, including water polo and 50m/25m training lanes
- Premier League-standard football pitch
- 400m Olympic running track
- NBA-spec basketball court with auditorium
- 600-seat auditorium
- Spaces for historical and cultural exploration
- An elevated football field that doubles as a helipad
- Specialist robotics and science laboratories
- AR and VR-enabled learning centres
- Disruption Lab and Research Centre for developing entrepreneurial skills
More coverage from the Future Forum
World Cup warm up matches
May 24 Pakistan v Afghanistan, Bristol; Sri Lanka v South Africa, Cardiff
May 25 England v Australia, Southampton; India v New Zealand, The Oval
May 26 South Africa v West Indies, Bristol; Pakistan v Bangladesh, Cardiff
May 27 Australia v Sri Lanka, Southampton; England v Afghanistan, The Oval
May 28 West Indies v New Zealand, Bristol; Bangladesh v India, Cardiff
Awar Qalb
Director: Jamal Salem
Starring: Abdulla Zaid, Joma Ali, Neven Madi and Khadija Sleiman
Two stars
Skewed figures
In the village of Mevagissey in southwest England the housing stock has doubled in the last century while the number of residents is half the historic high. The village's Neighbourhood Development Plan states that 26% of homes are holiday retreats. Prices are high, averaging around £300,000, £50,000 more than the Cornish average of £250,000. The local average wage is £15,458.
