Carly Simon

Carly Simon (born June 25, 1943, New York City, New York, U.S.) is an American singer-songwriter and children’s book writer known for her often confessional pop songs that epitomized the adult contemporary music genre that dominated the charts in the 1970s. Her hits include “You’re So Vain” and “Anticipation.”

Background and early career

Simon was raised in an upper-class musical home. Her father was a cofounder of the Simon & Schuster publishing house and a pianist, and her mother was a singer and civil rights activist. Simon and her two sisters all pursued music; her brother became a photographer. Simon quit Sarah Lawrence College to perform with her sister Lucy as the Simon Sisters. In 1966, guided by Bob Dylan’s manager, Albert Grossman, and accompanied by members of the Band, she began a solo album that was never completed.

Success in the 1970s

Several years later, with songs mostly cowritten by film critic and screenwriter Jacob Brackman, Simon had a series of hit albums and singles—primarily romantic ballads sung in her plaintive alto—that included “That’s the Way I’ve Always Heard It Should Be” (1971) and “Anticipation” (1971). The album titled Anticipation earned her a Grammy in 1971 for best new artist.

Discover the fascinating events that shaped the world, straight from our editors.

SIGN UP

By clicking “Sign Up”, you consent to the Britannica Privacy Policy and Terms of Use.

Britannica Quiz

Oscar-Worthy Movie Trivia

Simon scored a career-defining hit with “You’re So Vain,” a song about a self-absorbed heartbreaker who goes unnamed, although the lyrics drop plenty of clues. The song, like the album No Secrets, reached number one on the Billboard chart in 1973. “You’re So Vain” was not the first “diss track” (a song with lyrics that take aim at a rival artist), but it set a songwriting standard in popular music that many female recording artists of the confessional variety tried to emulate. Simon eventually revealed the subject of one of the song’s verses to be actor Warren Beatty.

She had another major hit with her album Hotcakes (1974), which included “Haven’t Got Time for the Pain” as well as “Mockingbird” (1974), a duet with fellow singer-songwriter James Taylor, to whom she was married from 1972 to 1983. In 1977 she released “Nobody Does It Better,” the theme song to the James Bond movie The Spy Who Loved Me.

Music for films

Simon’s career dipped in the early 1980s. She took a break from releasing original work and turned to recording covers of pop standards (Torch, 1981). She returned to prominence by composing music for films; she had a hit with her song “Coming Around Again” (the theme to the 1986 movie Heartburn), and she won a Grammy (for best song written specifically for a motion picture or television; 1990), a Golden Globe Award (1989), and an Academy Award for “Let the River Run,” which she also sang, in Working Girl (1988). She also scored music for the films Postcards from the Edge (1990) and This Is My Life (1992).

Honors, memoirs, and Parkinson’s diagnosis

Simon was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1994, and in 2022 she was selected for induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. She also authored several children’s books, and in 2015 she published her memoir Boys in the Trees (a reference to her 1978 album of the same name), which focused on her romantic relationships and ended with the lengthiest section devoted to her tumultuous marriage to Taylor. In Touched by the Sun (2019) Simon chronicled her friendship with Jackie Kennedy Onassis.

Explore Britannica Premium!

The trusted destination for professionals, college students, and lifelong learners.

SUBSCRIBE

In 2026 Simon revealed that she had been diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease and had also been treated for skin cancer on her face, which had made her self-conscious about appearing in public. The announcement came a few weeks before the release of Comes in Waves, her first album of original material in nearly two decades. In a statement, Simon said that working on the album “gave me somewhere to go without having to leave the room. It reminded me that illness can change your life without becoming the whole of your life.”