When Barbra Streisand left her Brooklyn, New York home at 16, she was determined to hit the stage as an actress. With no permanent home at first, Streisand lived with friends and slept on an army cot she carried around before moving into a small apartment in the Theater District in Manhattan. Taking on whatever jobs she could find, Streisand eventually landed a weekly gig singing as an opening act for late comedian Phyllis Diller for $125 a week.
“I knew it since I was 7 years old,” said Streisand of her destiny in an interview with 60 Minutes in 1991. “It just had to be. There was no other way for me.”
By 1963, Streisand appeared on the Judy Garland Show for their duet “Happy Days Are Here Again/Get Happy” and released her debut album The Barbra Streisand Album, which received five Grammy nominations and won two: Album of the Year and Best Female Vocal Performance. Just five years later, Streisand starred in her first of nearly 20, Funny Girl, and picked up the Academy Award for Best Actress.
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In the years that followed, Streisand also starred in Hello, Dolly! (1969), What’s Up, Doc? (1972), and The Way We Were (1973) before writing and producing several songs on the soundtrack for A Star is Born, which earned her another Oscar.
By the early ’80s, Streisand starred in, co-written, co-produced, and directed the 1983 film Yentl, and went on to direct the 1991 Oscar-nominated drama The Prince of Tides and The Mirror Has Two Faces in 1996.
Throughout her career, Streisand has released 36 albums, 11 which topped the Billboard 200, including People (1964), The Way We Were (1974), Guilty (1980), and The Broadway Album (1985), along with hits “The Way We Were,” “Evergreen,” “You Don’t Bring Me Flowers,” “No More Tears (Enough Is Enough),” and “Woman in Love,” which all went to No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100.
[RELATED: Top 10 Barbra Streisand Songs]
In a career spanning more than 60 years, Streisand also had a hand in writing a number of her songs. Here’s a look behind just five songs Streisand wrote from the mid-1970s through the ’90s.
1. “By the Way” (1975)
Written by Barbra Streisand and Rupert Holmes
Streisand’s 17th release Lazy Afternoon features covers of Stevie Wonder‘s “You and I,” Libby Holman’s “Moanin’ Low,” and the Four Tops’ “Shake Me, Wake Me (When It’s Over).” On the album, she also co-wrote one song, “By the Way,” marking her first songwriting credit.
By the way, did I hear you say
If some night, I seem too lonely
You would stay
Oh, and by the way
Have I told you yet that only recently
He moved out on me
Took the towels we stole
From some motel in Tennessee
He was gone long before he really left
I knew it
By the way, he began to say
Love takes time, I’m in a hurry
Anyway, that’s all yesterday
Let’s get back to us
Why worry?
2. “Lost Inside of You” (1976)
Written by Leon Russell and Barbra Streisand
The soundtrack for A Star is Born featured two songs co-written by Streisand who also produced the album with Phil Ramone. Comparable to Bradley Cooper and Lady Gaga‘s “Shallow” from the 2018 A Star is Born remake, “Lost Inside of You” reveals the intense and rocky love between Kris Kristofferson, who plays rock star John Norman Howard, and Streisand’s Esther in the 1976 version. The film was based on the original 1937 movie starring Janet Gaynor and Fredric March, which was later adapted into a musical with Judy Garland and James Mason in 1954.
Time has come again
And love is in the wind
Like some music in a dream
You made them all come true
When you came inside of my life
Now I’m lost
Inside of you
Lost in the music
And lost in your eyes
3. “Evergreen” (1976)
Written by Barbra Streisand and Paul Williams
Co-written with Paul Williams and sung as a duet with Kristofferson, the love theme from A Star is Born, “Evergreen” marked Streisand’s second No. 1 song on the Billboard Hot 100, following “The Way We Were” in 1974.
[RELATED: 5 Songs You Didn’t Know Kris Kristofferson Wrote for Other Artists, First]
“She sat down and played on a guitar, the melody for ‘Evergreen’ that she’d written,” said Williams in 2007 of working on “Evergreen” with Streisand. “It was just such a beautiful melody. I said, ‘There’s your love song. There’s the big love song.’ I asked her for the melody. She put it on tape for me, and I took it home. I actually wrote that as the last thing, which I think bothered her. But all the Kris Kristofferson stuff was the first thing up on the shoot schedule. So I wrote the songs for Kris first.”
Williams added, “I actually wrote those first two lines in the opposite order. I wrote ‘Love, fresh as the morning air, love soft as an easy chair.’ I called Barbra as I was getting on a plane to go on tour with Olivia Newton-John. … I called her and said, ‘You know what, flip those two first lines, because it sings better.’ ‘Love, soft as an easy chair, love, fresh as the morning air.’ ‘Morning’ sang better at that point in the song. And I remember saying to Barbra, ‘They’ll probably laugh us out of the theaters for starting a love song with a line about a chair, but I think it works better that way.’ And I think it was the biggest-selling soundtrack album ever at that time, and of course, the song won the triple crown: the Oscar, the Grammy, and the Golden Globe.”
Love, soft as an easy chair
Love, fresh as the morning air
One love that is shared by two
I have found with you
Like a rose under the April snow
I was always certain love would grow
Love ageless and evergreen
Seldom seen by two
You and I will make each night a first
Every day a beginning
Spirits rise and their dance is unrehearsed
They warm and excite us
‘Cause we have the brightest love
The song earned Streisand her second Academy Award for Best Original Song, making her the first woman to win an Oscar as a composer. “Evergreen” also won a Grammy Award for Song of the Year and a Golden Globe for Best Original Song.
4. “Wet” (1979)
Written by Barbra Streisand, Sue Sheridan, David Wolfert
Streisand’s 21st album Wet was a semi-concept album centering around water and featured the No. 1 hit “No More Tears (Enough Is Enough),” a duet with late disco singer Donna Summer. The title track, co-written by Streisand, continued the aqueous theme describing the coldness, and wetness, of kisses and tears of love.
Wet is rain
Rain is clean and new
New is the morning and morning dew
Wet is a kiss that touches you
Wet is sea
Sea is mysterious blue
Blue is for sadness
And sad is for crying
Tears are wet too
Would you share these things with me
Dance in the rain
Drift with the sea
And let the tears fall as they wade
5. “I Finally Found Someone” (1996)
Written by Barbra Streisand, Bryan Adams, Robert John “Mutt” Lange, Marvin Hamlisch
The theme song from the 1996 romantic comedy The Mirror Has Two Faces, starring Barbra Streisand, who also directed the film, and Jeff Bridges, “I Finally Found Someone” went to No. 2 on the Billboard Adult Contemporary chart and No. 8 on the Hot 100. Performed as a duet between Streisand and co-writer Bryan Adams, and arranged by David Foster, the song plays over the closing credits of the film.
“I wrote the love theme, the main love theme, then Marvin [Hamlisch]wrote a bridge to it, and that was going to be our song,” said Streisand in 1996. “Then David Foster had the idea that I should sing the duet with Bryan Adams. Bryan played our track and heard me humming and fell in love with this little theme that I wrote and then he and his producer Mutt Lange wrote a counter melody based on the track that I sent him, and they wrote the lyrics.”
[RELATED: 3 Songs You Didn’t Know Jeff Bridges Wrote]
Streisand added, “I don’t think his record company wanted him [Adams] to sing with me, because I’m more traditional, and I haven’t had a hit since I don’t know when.”
“I Finally Found Someone” was Streisand’s first Top 10 hit in nearly a decade and her first gold single since “Guilty,” the title track of her 22nd album, which was written by the Bee Gees‘ Barry, Maurice and Robin Gibbs and earned her a Grammy for Best Pop Vocal Performance, Duo or Group.
I finally found someone
Who knocks me off my feet
I finally found the one
Who makes me feel complete
It started over coffee
We started out as friends
It’s funny how from simple things
The best things begin
This time is different la la la la
It’s all because of you la la la la
It’s better than it’s ever been
‘Cause we can talk it through
Photo: Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images
