Singer and songwriter of such pop canon hits as Oh! Carol, Breaking Up Is Hard to Do and (Is This the Way to) Amarillo

“Prolific” hardly does justice to Neil Sedaka’s songwriting output, which ran to more than 1,000 compositions over seven decades.

If he had been willing to stay behind the scenes, turning out tunes for other singers, he would have still merited a place in pop history thanks to the number of those songs that became part of the pop canon, including Where the Boys Are, Love Will Keep Us Together and (Is This the Way to) Amarillo. However, Sedaka, who has died aged 86, had a constitutional need to see his own name in lights.