116 BILLBOARD | AUGUST 24, 2019
KWAKU ALSTON/FOURELEVEN.AGENCYFor nearly four decades, songwriter Diane Warren has
perfected the art of the power ballad. Realsongs, which
she founded in 1987, has become the most successful
female-owned music publisher in the world, and the hits
she has written — for Whitney Houston, Céline Dion,
Aretha Franklin, Mariah Carey and others — earned her
a 2001 induction into the Songwriters Hall of Fame.
Today, Warren’s discography boasts a whopping nine
No. 1 hits on the Billboard Hot 100, including Toni
Braxton’s “Un-Break My Heart” (11 weeks) and Dion’s
“Because You Loved Me” (six). But it was her 1997
smash “How Do I Live” — initially intended for the
Con Air soundtrack and recorded separately by both
country singer Trisha Yearwood and a then-14-year-old
LeAnn Rimes — that made the biggest impact on the
charts. Despite peaking at No. 2 on the Hot 100, Rimes’
version is still the longest-running song by a female
artist on the chart, with 69 weeks. Warren looks back on
the making of the historic hit.After LeAnn won the best new artist Grammy [in
1996], I ran into her at a restaurant. She was the young
hot artist at the time. I told her I wrote this song for
Con Air — though I didn’t mention that there were 200
songs in contention — and literally the next day she
demoed it. After Trisha’s version ended up in the film,
[LeAnn’s label] Curb Records wasn’t going to put it out,
so I called [founder] Mike Curb and said, “You have to
put it out. It’s a hit record for her.”
Even though LeAnn came from the country world,
I figured she had a better shot at crossing over into
pop, and my prediction was right. Trisha had a massive
career and a Grammy-winning country hit because of
it, but LeAnn’s version exploded. It was everywhere.
They split up territories around the world: Trisha’s
was a big hit in Australia and peaked at No. 2 on Hot
Country Songs in the U.S., while LeAnn had the pop
hit here. Elton John’s “Candle in the Wind” kept it from
reaching the top, so the biggest song ever by a female
artist in Billboard never went to No. 1. Numbers aren’t
everything, though. I love writing the emotional ones,
what can I say? I’m a song sadist: I like to rip your heart
out and make you cry. —AS TOLD TO NICK WILLIAMSDIANE WARREN
SONGWRITER; OWNER, REALSONGSWarren
photographed by
Kwaku Alston
in 2018.
A SONG FOR
ALL SEASONS“Diane really hit
the co-dependency
nerve of our society
with ‘How Do I Live’ —
it’s played at weddings,
funerals and just about
every pivotal life-
altering moment.
I loved it from the very
moment Diane
played it for me.”—LEANN RIMESTHE LEGACY
Y Thirty-two top 10s on the Hot 100,
including DeBarge’s “Rhythm of the
Night” (1985) and Cher’s “If I Could Turn
Back Time” (1989).Y Named songwriter of the year six
times by ASCAP and four times by
the Billboard Music Awards.Y Ten Academy Award nominations for
best original song, including Starship’s
Mannequin track “Nothing’s Gonna
Stop Us Now” (1988) and Aerosmith’s
Armageddon anthem, “I Don’t Want to
Miss a Thing” (1998).