Will Jennings, the songwriter known for hits such as My Heart Will Go On, has died at the age of 80.
Jennings’ death was announced on Friday, August 6, by his longtime publisher.
No cause of death has been released, but the songwriter is said to have been ill for some time.
Jennings won an Oscar in 1998 for the Titanic theme song, co-starring with the late composer James Horner for the hit song sung by Celine Dion.
More than a decade earlier, Jennings had won the Academy Award for Best Original Song for Up Where We Belong from An Officer and a Gentleman, starring Debra Winger and Richard Gere.
He shared that honor with co-writers Jack Nitzsche and Buffy Sainte-Marie.
Will Jennings, a two-time Oscar-winning songwriter, has died at the age of 80 (pictured in New York City in June 2006)
The emotional song Tears in Heaven, sung by Eric Clapton and heard in the film Rush, won a Golden Globe and a Grammy in 1993.
Jennings was born in June 1944 in Kilgore, Texas. After earning a degree in English from Stephen F. Austin State University in his home state, he went to college. He taught for three years at the University of Wisconsin at Eau Claire.
During his prolific career, Jennings wrote hits for a variety of artists, including Whitney Houston, Mariah Carey, Jimmy Buffett, Tim McGraw and more.
Houston’s Didn’t We Almost Have It All? hit number one, as did Barry Manilow’s Looks Like We Made It.
Jennings produced two hits for Steve Winwood – Higher Love and Roll With It, along with the popular songs Back in the High Life Again and Don’t You Know What the Night Can Do.
The prolific artist was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2006.
Jennings won the Oscar for Best Original Song, along with the late James Horner, for Celine Dion’s My Heart Will Go On from Titanic (pictured in Los Angeles in 1998)
In 1983, Jennings won the Academy Award for Best Original Song for Up Where We Belong from An Officer and a Gentleman, starring Debra Winger and Richard Gere. He shared the honor with co-writers Jack Nitzsche and Buffy Sainte-Marie
Jennings was a prolific songwriter, working with a variety of artists, writing Eric Clapton’s Tears in Heaven, Barry Manilow’s Looks Like We Made It, and Whitney Houston’s Didn’t We Almost Have It, among others (Pictured in New York City in 2006)
His good friend Peter Wolf paid tribute to Jennings on social media.
“A sad time, the passing of Will Jennings, a maestro, brilliant mind and gentle spirit,” the former J. Geils Band frontman began.
“Will shared his talents with me, always patiently and generously. He was a dear friend and teacher who enriched my life in so many ways.”
‘It was an immense honour to have worked for so many years with such a musical genius… To quote one of his favourite poets, W. B. Yeats: “Think where the glory of man most begins and ends, and say that my glory was that I had such friends.”‘
