Biography

John Gregory Bettis (born October 24, 1946) is an American lyricist. He was originally part of the band Spectrum, which also featured Richard and Karen Carpenter. He wrote the lyrics for "Top of the World", a hit for both Lynn Anderson and The Carpenters. He wrote several more hits for The Carpenters, including "Only Yesterday", "Goodbye to Love" and "Yesterday Once More". He later wrote hits for other artists including Madonna ("Crazy for You"), Michael Jackson ("Human Nature"), The Pointer Sisters ("Slow Hand"), Conway Twitty ("Slow Hand"), Diana Ross ("When You Tell Me That You Love Me"), Jennifer Warnes ("Nights Are Forever"), Peabo Bryson ("Can You Stop the Rain"), George Strait ("Heartland"), Juice Newton ("Heart of the Night"), Ronnie Milsap ("Only One Love in My Life"), Barbara Mandrell ("One of a Kind Pair of Fools"), 38 Special ("Like No Other Night"),

New Kids on the Block ("If You Go Away"), Donna Summer ("The Woman in Me"),

Barbra Streisand ("Sweet Forgiveness"), Whitney Houston ("One Moment in Time")

He has been nominated four times and won two Emmy Awards for his work in television. His first Emmy was for the theme to the 1988 Summer Olympics co-written with Albert Hammond, and his second win was for "Where There is Hope" from Guiding Light.

Bettis has written the themes for many long-running TV series. With Steve Dorff, he wrote the theme to Growing Pains, Just the Ten of Us and My Sister Sam.

With George Tipton, he wrote the themes to Empty Nest and Nurses.

He was nominated for a Golden Globe and an Oscar for Promise Me You'll Remember from The Godfather Part III.

His work in film also includes: Star Trek V: The Final Frontier, Body Rock, The Last Boy Scout, Twilight Zone: The Movie, The Lonely Guy, Legend, Vision Quest, Supergirl, The Men's Club, Pure Country, Nothing in Common, Cocktail, 8 Seconds, Cobra, Back to the Beach, Oh, God! You Devil, December Boys, Curly Sue and Say Anything.

In theatre, Bettis has provided lyrics for the musicals Lunch (tour 1994); Svengali (1992); The Last Session (L.A. Drama critics Award, Best Musical Score 1998); Say Goodnight (1999); Pure Country (2008) and most recently Josephine (2011).

Bettis has nearly 800 song credits in the ASCAP database. In 2011, Bettis was inducted into both the Songwriters Hall of Fame as well as the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame. Biography

Official EMI Biography

John Bettis at IMDb