Rodney Marvin McKuen ( mə-KEW-ən; né Woolever; April 29, 1933 – January 29, 2015) was an American poet, singer-songwriter and composer. He was one of the best-selling poets in the United States during the late 1960s. Throughout his career, McKuen produced a wide range of recordings, which included popular music, spoken word poetry, film soundtracks and classical music. He earned two Academy Award nominations for his music compositions. McKuen's translations and adaptations of the songs of Jacques Brel were instrumental in bringing the Belgian songwriter to prominence in the English-speaking world. His poetry deals with themes of love, the natural world and spirituality. McKuen's songs sold over 100 million recordings worldwide and 60 million books of his poetry were sold as well.
McKuen was born as Rodney Marvin Woolever on April 29, 1933, in a Salvation Army hostel in Oakland, California to Clarice Woolever. According to critic Betty Jean Lifton in The New York Times, McKuen had "two birth certificates, each giving conflicting dates and spelling his father's name different ways." He never knew his biological father, who had left his mother. Sexually and physically abused by relatives, raised by his mother and stepfather, who was a violent alcoholic, McKuen ran away from home. He drifted along the West Coast, supporting himself as a ranch hand, surveyor, railroad worker, lumberjack, rodeo cowboy, stuntman and radio disc jockey, always sending money home to his mother.
At some point, he began using the name "McKuen" as the best approximation of what he thought his father's name was. His mother told him that his father's name was "Mac" McKuen (although she was unsure how it was spelled). At one point later in life, McKuen hired a detective agency to try to locate his father. Again per Lifton in The New York Times, "Whether or not he found his father, at least he (and the detectives) found a man 10 years deceased who satisfies him -- Rodney Marion McKune, a lumberman in Utah, twice married (the last time to a woman 20 years his senior), who at the close of his life was an iceman in Santa Monica, Calif., 20 miles from where McKuen was living. No relative of this McKune remembers him taking a trip from Utah to Oakland that summer of 1932 when the author was conceived, but a Mormon churchman remembers taking a trip there with him in 1931 or 1932."
To compensate for his lack of formal education, McKuen began keeping a journal, which resulted in his first poetry and song lyrics. After dropping out of Oakland Technical High School prior to graduating in 1951, McKuen worked as a newspaper columnist and propaganda script writer during the Korean War. He settled in San Francisco, where he read his poetry in clubs alongside Beat poets like Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg. He began performing as a folk singer at the folk club Purple Onion. Over time, he began incorporating his own songs into his act. McKuen was signed to Decca Records and released several pop albums in the late 1950s. McKuen also appeared as an actor in Rock, Pretty Baby (1956), Summer Love (1958) and the western Wild Heritage (1958). He also sang with Lionel Hampton's band. In 1959, McKuen moved to New York City to compose and conduct music for the TV show The CBS Workshop. McKuen appeared on To Tell The Truth on June 18, 1962, as a decoy contestant and described himself as "a published poet and a twist singer."
In the early 1960s, McKuen moved to France, where he first met the Belgian singer-songwriter and chanson singer Jacques Brel. McKuen began to translate the work of this composer into English, which led to the song "If You Go Away" – an international pop-standard – based on Brel's "Ne me quitte pas". McKuen translated Brel's song "Le Moribond" loosely into "Seasons in the Sun", and British folkbeat group The Fortunes charted with the song in the Netherlands in 1969. In 1974, singer Terry Jacks turned McKuen's "Seasons in the Sun" into a best-selling pop hit, and also charted with a cover of "If You Go Away." McKuen also translated songs by other French songwriters, including Georges Moustaki, Gilbert Bécaud, Pierre Delanoé, and Michel Sardou.
In 1978, after hearing of Brel's death, McKuen was quoted as saying, "As friends and as musical collaborators we had traveled, toured and written – together and apart – the events of our lives as if they were songs, and I guess they were. When news of Jacques' death came I stayed locked in my bedroom and drank for a week. That kind of self-pity was something he wouldn't have approved of, but all I could do was replay our songs (our children) and ruminate over our unfinished life together."
In the mid-1960s, McKuen began to publish books of poetry, earning a substantial following among young people with collections like Stanyan Street & Other Sorrows (1966), Listen to the Warm (1967), and Lonesome Cities (1968). His Lonesome Cities album of readings won a Grammy for Best Spoken Word Recording in 1968. McKuen's poems were translated into eleven languages and his books sold over 1 million copies in 1968 alone. McKuen said that his most romantic poetry was influenced by American poet Walter Benton's two books of poems. McKuen sold over 60 million books worldwide, according to the Associated Press.
McKuen wrote over 1,500 songs and released up to 200 albums which have accounted for the sale of over 100 million records worldwide according to the Associated Press. His songs have been performed by such diverse artists as Robert Goulet, Glenn Yarbrough, Barbra Streisand, Perry Como, Petula Clark, Waylon Jennings, The Boston Pops, Chet Baker, Jimmie Rodgers, Johnny Cash, Pete Fountain, Andy Williams, The Kingston Trio, Percy Faith, the London Philharmonic, Nana Mouskouri, Daliah Lavi, Julio Iglesias, Dusty Springfield, Johnny Mathis, Al Hirt, Greta Keller, Aaron Freeman, and Frank Sinatra.
In 1959, McKuen released his first novelty single with Bob McFadden under the pseudonym Dor on the Brunswick label, called "The Mummy". The McKuen-written song reached No. 39 on the Billboard pop chart. In 1961, he had a hit single titled "Oliver Twist". He co-wrote it along with Gladys Shelley and the Spiral label-issued single reached No. 76 on the Billboard pop chart. His hoarse and throaty singing voice on these and other recordings was a result of McKuen straining his vocal cords in 1961 due to too many promotional appearances.
McKuen collaborated with numerous composers, including Henry Mancini, John Williams, Anita Kerr, and Arthur Greenslade. His symphonies, concertos, and other orchestral works have been performed by orchestras around the world. His work as a composer in the film industry garnered him two Academy Award nominations for The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie (1969) and A Boy Named Charlie Brown (1969), and his other film scores have included Joanna (1968), Me, Natalie (1969), Scandalous John (1971), The Borrowers (1973) and Emily (1976). McKuen's contribution to A Boy Named Charlie Brown, the first feature-length animation based on Charles M. Schulz's comic strip Peanuts also included him singing the title song. McKuen also earned a mention in the Peanuts strip dated October 3, 1969, in which Sally Brown expresses her frustration that she was sent to the principal's office for an outburst in art class, opining that Pablo Picasso and Rod McKuen surely must have had trouble drawing cows' legs when they were young.
In 1967, McKuen began collaborating with arranger Anita Kerr and the San Sebastian Strings for a series of albums featuring McKuen's poetry recited over Kerr's mood music, including The Sea (1967), The Earth (1967), The Sky (1968), Home to the Sea (1969), For Lovers (1969), and The Soft Sea (1970). Jesse Pearson was the narrator of The Sea and its follow-ups Home to the Sea and The Soft Sea, while most other albums in the series had McKuen narrating. In 1969, Frank Sinatra commissioned an entire album of poems and songs by McKuen; arranged by Don Costa, it was released under the title A Man Alone: The Words and Music of Rod McKuen. The album featured the song "Love's Been Good to Me", which became one of McKuen's best-known songs.