John Bettis

John Bettis (born 24 October 1946) is an American lyricist who has co-written many famous popular songs over the years. He was originally part of the band Spectrum, which also featured Richard and Karen Carpenter. He would provide the lyrics for many hit songs for The Carpenters' ("Top of the World", "Only Yesterday", "Goodbye to Love"), and later for other famous artists such as Madonna ("Crazy For You"), Michael Jackson ("Human Nature"), The Pointer Sisters ("Slow Hand") Diana Ross ("When You Tell Me That You Love Me").

He was born in Long Beach, California, the son of Wayne Douglas and Nellie Jane (House) Bettis, and attended California State University.

Bettis has had Academy Award and Golden Globe nominations for "Promise Me You'll Remember", as Best Original Song for his work on "Godfather III". Other nominations include: Grammy nominations for "Can You Stop The Rain" - Best R&B Song; "One Moment In Time" - Best Song, Film & TV (Theme, 1988 Olympics). John received two Emmy Awards: "Where There is Hope" and "One Moment In Time" and received Emmy nominations for "Swept Away" - Best Music & Lyrics and "As Long As We Got Each Other" - Best Music & Lyrics. He was also nominated for Nashville Songwriters Association [http://www.nashvillesongwriters.com/] Song of the Year and Music City Song of the Year.

He has also been working in theatre, providing lyrics for the musicals "Lunch" (tour 1994); "Svengali" (1992); "The Last Session" (L.A. Drama critics Award, Best Musical Score 1998); "Say Goodnight" (1999); "Heartland" (2000) and most recently "Josephine Baker" (2003).

As of mid-2008, Bettis has nearly 800 song credits in the ASCAP database.

References

* [http://www.filmreference.com/film/66/John-Bettis.html Biography]