Jimmy Webb’s accomplishments as a writer, composer, arranger, and producer demonstrate beyond question that he remains as important and vital a cultural figure today as he was over thirty years ago. Embraced by his peers, Webb has influenced and affected some of the finest musical talents of our time. Frank Sinatra declared “By The Time I Get To Phoenix” as “the greatest torch song ever written,” and said he enjoyed singing Jimmy Webb tunes because “he has been blessed with the emotions and artistic talent of the great lyricists.” The late Sammy Cahn commented, “I think one of the real, real geniuses is Jimmy Webb. His “MacArthur Park” is a major piece of work, major. I’d almost compare it to Gershwin’s “Rhapsody in Blue” in size and scope.” Michael Feinstein, who recorded Webb’s “Time Enough For Love,” for his 1993 album, Forever, and included another Webb track (“Wasn’t There A Moment”) on his Such Sweet Sorrow, says he’s “interested in the work of the great masters from any era, and certainly, Jimmy Webb is a master of this era, of today.” Feinstein also recorded an “all-Webb” album for 2002 and premiered the track, “These Are All Mine” at Carnegie Hall with Jimmy as his special guest in April, ’01. Billy Joel credits Jimmy as a major influence on his own foray into the music business. “When I was starting out as a songwriter,” says Joel, “I looked to Jimmy Webb as one of the most innovative and musically proficient songwriters of our generation.” His songs transcend their precedent-setting critical and commercial acclaim to achieve the level of true classics – a permanent part of the American musical landscape, the soundtrack of an era. In his book about songwriting, Webb states, “the paramount joy of the craft is that, however simply it is begun, it can take the songwriter on a lifelong voyage across many distant and wondrous musical seas.” For Jimmy Webb, that’s a spectacular series of events indeed.