Greatest Songwriter of all time

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...

You guys have a good point, but, while I acknowledge the greatness of the composers listed by Rayhall, still Buddy Holly was the best composer since Bach, and the best songwriter ever.

Paul,..guess I was eight, or so, when Mr. Holly's plane went down..being from Iowa, we all remember it like people in Madison, Wi. remember Otis and his plane going down in Lake Monona. Anyway, Buddy was one of the very few to have his impact great enough to have a group name themselves after him..ie: the Hollies. Wonder if Bobby Vee would have had a career without sounding like Mr. Holly?

Seems like Buddy Holly song's are so good that no matter who(m) does their cover....it still sounds good.