Barry Mann

I know at the beginning of our careers, my wife and I were gut wrenchingly competitive.

— Barry Mann

You have to be very brave in that first writing session.

— Barry Mann

Probably most successful songwriters have an innate songwriting ability.

— Barry Mann

We've written something like 900 songs in all.

— Barry Mann

I quit college. I was studying architecture for about a year.

— Barry Mann

It's very important, at least for me and for Cynthia, to get outside input.

— Barry Mann

It's amazing how a competitive nature can turn a negative into something positive.

— Barry Mann

You've got to really be able to accept the rejection.

— Barry Mann

If I waited for inspiration every time I sat down to write a song I probably would be a plumber today.

— Barry Mann

I also used to work in the Catskill Mountains as a bus boy, and I performed in talent shows.

— Barry Mann

I get a different kind of lyric from someone else that might make me go in a different musical direction.

— Barry Mann

The real danger of writing a great song when you're on something is that it might get you thinking that the only…

— Barry Mann

I think if one wants to be in a continual state of insanity one should stay married to that writing partner.

— Barry Mann

I looked through our catalog year by year, and I saw that there were pockets of time when we wrote some terrific…

— Barry Mann

We became the songs we wrote.

— Barry Mann

You're going to have more rejection than acceptance.

— Barry Mann

You can get stale writing with each other for a while.

— Barry Mann

I've written songs sober and I've written songs high.

— Barry Mann

If we didn't get the record, we didn't exist.

— Barry Mann

We lived, ate, and breathed pop songs.

— Barry Mann

Cynthia's lyrics always expressed the feelings people felt but they couldn't express themselves.

— Barry Mann

I think that most writers who wait until they're inspired to write are just waiting for the fear to subside.

— Barry Mann

Who put the bomp in the bomp-bomp-bomp-bomp-bomp, who put the ram in the rama-lama-ding-dong?

— Barry Mann

One other thing, if it's possible, as songwriters, you should also develop yourself as record producers.

— Barry Mann

If we were the team that won out, then life was good and we felt that we were worth something.

— Barry Mann

It's very hard to teach someone how to write a song if to begin with there's no creative crop to harvest.

— Barry Mann

You have certain writing tools but generally creating something from nothing makes one quite mad and Cynthia and I are quite mad…

— Barry Mann

There's so much fear involved in trying to do something you don't know how to do that drugs and alcohol can become…

— Barry Mann

A guitar riff played on a piano doesn't come close to the purity of it being played on a guitar but I…

— Barry Mann