26. Up Where We Belong - Joe Cocker & Jennifer Warnes - July
The entire process - from idea to inclusion in the movie and release - took only 30 days. Will Jennings wrote the lyrics. He's responsible for the words to many famous songs, including "My Heart Will Go On," "Looks Like We Made It," and many of Steve Winwood's hits. Jennings told us:
"Joel Sill, who was head of the music department of Paramount, asked me to consider writing a song for this film. I watched a rough cut, loved the film and I heard enough parts to make up a song. I asked Joel to send me the work track and I stitched together the verse, chorus, and bridge of the song and wrote the lyrics... Joel sent it to Stewart Levine, a fine music producer, and Stewart and I talked the song over on the phone and he went in to the studio and cut the hit track with Joe Cocker and Jennifer Warnes."
Will Jennings told us about coming up with the words to this song: "I am a working class person and these people in the film trying to make it, they are my people. The mountain imagery is about striving for the top - people often don't hear the lyric right - it is 'Where eagles cry, on a mountain high' instead of 'Where eagles fly, on a mountain high' - if you have ever heard an eagle cry, the power and beauty of it and all the wild freedom of it, you will get the distinction. As far as "All I know is the way I feel...' well, if you have nothing else to tell you what to do in your life, you have to go with the way you feel... if you are lost, you have only your instinct and passion to guide you."
The song reached number one on the Billboard Hot 100 in the US and topped the charts in several other countries. It also sold more than one million copies in the US and was recognized by the Recording Industry Association of America as one of the Songs of the Century. Cocker and Warnes were awarded the Grammy for Best Pop Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocals, and Nitzsche, Sainte-Marie, and Jennings won both the Academy Award and Golden Globe Award for Best Original Song.