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The guys behind Ed Sheeran, Justin Timberlake, Bon Jovi, Maroon 5 & Chainsmokers hits win ASCAP Awards

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Desmond Child (Lester Cohen/Getty Images for ASCAP)Monday night at the 35th Annual ASCAP Pop Music Awards, four songwriters responsible for some of the past year’s biggest hits were honored with a Pop Music Songwriter of the Year award.

Among the honorees: The Chainsmokers Drew Taggart, for the duo’s hits “Something Just Like This” and “Closer”; Max Martin, for Adele‘sSend My Love,” Pink‘s “Just Like Fire” and Justin Timberlake‘s “Can’t Stop the Feeling”; and Steve Mac, for Pink’s “What About Us” and 2017’s biggest hit, “Shape of You,” by Ed Sheeran.

On the red carpet, Steve Mac told ABC Radio that after a mutual friend — British singer Anne Marie — introduced him to Ed, “Shape of You” took almost no time to write.

“[T]his [song] was the very first thing we did,” Steve explained. “I look back and I think, ‘If I hadn’t done that, if I hadn’t turned up, or if I hadn’t felt great, we never would have written that song’…Within an hour and a half, we recorded and wrote [it].”

Also Monday night, veteran songwriter Desmond Child received the ASCAP Founders Award winner for writing hits like Bon Jovi‘s “You Give Love a Bad Name” and “Livin’ on a Prayer,” Ricky Martin‘s “Livin’ La Vida Loca,” and Aerosmith’s “Crazy.”  Child told ABC Radio he and Bon Jovi guitarist Richie Sambora had to beg Jon Bon Jovi to cut “Livin’ on a Prayer.”

“He said, ‘Y’know, I’m not really feeling it. I’d like to rock a little harder on this record before I do something sentimental like that,'” recalled Desmond. “And we just literally, kinda half-joking but half not, got on our hands and knees and begged him to record it and put it on the record…and that just made all the difference in the world.”

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