Greatest Songwriter of all time


I was reading the Dylan post and it got me thinking. There are many great songwriters that come to mind, my expertise/knowledge is primarily with rock music. If you could only pick three, what would they be? My vote for best lyrics goes to:

Jim Morrison
Bruce Springsteen
Elvis Costello

Best music goes to:

Mark Knopfler
Stevie Ray Vaughn
Frank Zappa
jeffloistarca
Bencampbell, I agree. Onhwy61, what about the music of Blonde on blonde and Highway 61. Is this not some of rocks greatest and original tunes? Yea, a bit taken from here and there, but still some of rocks greatest and original tunes. No?
Forever an Onhwy61 fan.
Oh ya..Hank of course I mean who hasn't done his songs? Cold cold heart has everybodies name on it.
Townsvanzant personal choice. Guy Clark is amazing the words are ...perfect?Three is not enough
Gram Parsons ,Leonard Cohen,Proffessor Longhair
I mean these guys wrote and could sing?Many more are out there ...these are in my head at the moment
Teams
-Fagan/becker
-Rogers/Hammerstein
-Lennon/McCartney
-Davies/Hodgson
-Waters/Gilmore
Solos
-Brian Wilson
-Sting
-Frampton
-Brothers Gibb
-Maurice White
-Christopher Cross
-Stevie Nicks
-Peter Cetera
-Harry Nilson
-Don Henley
-Robbie Kroger
Duke Ellington
Jelly Roll Morton
Cole Porter
Scott Joplin
Irving Berlin
George Gershwin
Richard Rogers
Jerome Kern

The following guys were good, but in no way come up to the level of the previous songwriters:

Lennon & McCartney
Bob Dylan
Woody Guthrie

You know, we should all try to get out of our own era and geography a little bit. Nearly all of us have only picked from the twentieth century and most, only from a 30-40 year period within the twentieth century. What about foreign songwriters? What about music from other cultures? What about those from other centuries? Where do Bach, Beethoven and Mozart stand in this list? Remember, although we consider their music classical, it was the popular music of their time and 300-400 years later, we still listen to it. The name of the thread is greatest songwriter of all time, not greatest American songwriter from the last 20, 30, 40 or 50 years who wrote a couple of songs that I like a lot.
Rayhall,.. could not agree more. My post further up had zip impact on people thinking beyond their own time. It is a bit too bad since most of the late 20th century writers that most above are speaking of..were greatly impacted by those that came before them.

Seems that most are in the 30 to 50 year old range...I guess this same thread a few years from now will bring answers like:

InSync
Madonna
Boyz To Men
Faith Hill
etc...