The Brill Building at 1619 Broadway was a perfect example of what a New York pal of mine calls "vertical integration". You could write a song on one floor, hawk it to a publisher on another and get it scored and arranged down the corridor. Then, and still without leaving the building, you could gather up a bunch of musicians, book a studio, record the demo, flog it to a record company and undertake any other business with managers, representatives or the artists themselves. There were even radio promoters in situ who would immediately set about getting that record out to the public. It was a simple, effective and very short-winded system. One building. One purpose.
Between 49th and 53rd Streets, the Brill Building got its name from the Brill brothers' clothing store situated on the corner at street-level. When the Depression hit, the brothers rented out space to anyone who wanted it, and the only people interested were music publishers. By the early 1960s, there were 165 music-related operations going on in this one building, and the Brill Building Sound became the beating heart of US pop.
From the late 1950s through to the mid-1960s, something extraordinary happened here. Songwriting teams such as Goffin and King, Leiber and Stoller, Mann and Weil, Bacharach and David, Pomus and Shuman, Barry and Greenwich and Sedaka and Greenfield put their heads down and turned out hit after hit. They smoothed out the rougher edges of rock 'n' roll, added strings and created a sound that appealed to almost everyone. It wasn't just another lame white version of black music - this was mostly quality stuff - strong songs well done.
Certainly, the Brill Building sound was inspired by black music. The writers, mostly from Brooklyn, were already serious devotees of r 'n' b, and while white acts are most often associated with Brill Building material, the songs were often first performed by black performers. Bacharach and David wrote for Dionne Warwick; Barry and Greenwich for the Ronettes and the Crystals; and the songs of Neil Sedaka, mostly associated with Connie Francis, were originally performed by LaVern Baker, the Clovers and Clyde McPhatter. Perhaps the most obvious example is Lieber and Stoller's Hound Dog, recorded by Big Mama Thornton three years before Elvis got his hands on it. And, in fairness to Presley, he managed to pull off something which hadn't happened very often - the white version turned out better than the original.
There were also a few black writers on board - Otis Blackwell who wrote All Shook Up, Don't Be Cruel and Great Balls of Fire - but for the most part they were Jewish. In fact, much of it was multi-ethnic stuff - Afro-American, Jewish, Anglo, and a lot of it informed by the music of the huge Puerto Rican population explosion at the time. Latin bands were everywhere; people just loved to dance to the music, and there's no doubt that the secret of so many of the Brill Building hits was that very Puerto Rican element. Add a rumba beat to anything and you were well on your way. In fact, Doc Pomus, one of the Brill Building's greatest songwriters and the subject of the Lou Reed album Magic and Loss, once referred to the music as "Jewish-Latin". Whatever it was, it worked.
Pomus and his partner Mort Shuman wrote hundreds of songs between 1958 and 1965, the Drifters and Elvis Presley fighting over many of them. From early hits, such as Teenager in Love recorded by Dion and the Belmont, Pomus and Shuman turned out a staggering catalogue of songs - Sweets for My Sweet, Save the Last Dance For Me, Surrender, Marie's The Name of His Latest Flame, Little Sister, Suspicion, Viva Las Vegas and so on.
It was a Tin Pan Alley culture at the Brill Building - no hanging around waiting for the muse, no tantrums, no fuss. Songs were written, published, recorded and sold with amazing speed. And yet it was not a cynical production line like the boy-band phenomenon or the current Nashville scene. This was different. It was an industrious, creative frenzy. It was phenomenal talent, and, in some cases, it was sheer genius. Most of the composers were classically trained. Bacharach studied with Darius Milhaud, Mike Stoller with Stefan Wolpe.
And while it may be an urban myth, Rubenstein himself had good things to say about Neil Sedaka's playing of Chopin! And although a classical hinterland is not always a good thing when it comes to pop, in this case it worked. Firstly, it was a useful discipline in such a busy environment, where reading and writing skills were obviously necessary. Secondly, that classical training also made its way into the music itself - not just in encouraging string arrangements, but also in less obvious ways, informing the melodies themselves. Like good Beatles tunes, they often seemed to have classical parents.
It is tempting simply to make further lists of songs composed by the other Brill Building writers, but this article just isn't big enough. Perhaps a better idea is to suggest that you simply recall a song from the period, whether it be a song of teen heartbreak or a perhaps a more loaded song of life in the city. Just think of a song - any song - which is still in your head and your heart, and the chances are that it was written somewhere between 49th and 53rd Street. And if you ever happen to be passing 1619 Broadway, perhaps a quick salute or quiet genuflection is in order. Or, as you look up at all that vertical integration, you might even be tempted to burst into a vocal tribute. A few bars of On Broadway couldn't be more appropriate.