After spending last week chronicling The New York Times‘ selections of the ’30 Greatest Living American Songwriters,’ this week I’m turning to my own list.

Unlike The Times, I have no obligation to represent multiple genres or recognize major historic figures. My list is entirely based on my tastes and habits, which are relatively narrow given the scope of American popular music over the past 50 years or so. And, yes, I know this list is extremely white. So am I. What can you do?

I’m breaking the list down into a few categories to spread it out over the week. I’ll also include a reminder of the NYT selections I share in each of the groupings.

First up is what I’ll call the Old Guard. These are artists whose first recordings were released in 1980 or before. This group includes the two names I think were most glaringly absent from the Times‘ list.

Five titans appear on both the NYT list and mine: Bob Dylan, Carole King, Smokey Robinson, Paul Simon, and Bruce Springsteen.

My other Old Guard selections:

Billy Joel
Joel was the single biggest oversight by The Times, and one they heard about from hordes of angry fans. The snobs on the selection panel defended his absence by suggesting that he is schmaltzy, he has limited range, or they just don’t like him.

I can’t debate personal preferences or accusations of schmaltz, but the suggestion that Joel writes just one or two types of song is stupid. Sure, he’s primarily a piano rocker/balladeer, but the number of great (and very different) songs he has produced over his career is astounding. I don’t see how even the most jaded critic can be immune to the brilliance of ‘Vienna,’ ‘Scenes from an Italian Restaurant,’ ‘Stiletto,’ ‘Summer, Highland Falls,’ ‘Don’t Ask Me Why,’ ‘The Downeaster Alexa,’ or ‘Allentown,’ to name just a few.

Madonna
Like Mariah Carey, who made the Times‘ list, Madonna is a credited songwriter on just about every song she’s ever released. And while she doesn’t quite have Carey’s volume of hits, I’d argue that her music is more influential, more groundbreaking, and more creatively inspired.

Aimee Mann
Starting with Til Tuesday and through ten superb solo albums, Mann has established herself as a queen of melancholy pop and one of my favorite artists.

Randy Newman
This is the other head-scratching omission from the NYT list, and one I haven’t heard mentioned by the curators in the aftermath. I wonder if that’s because they can’t come up with any good reasons not to include him.

Newman is a master satirist and one of the only songwriters who can deliver both deeply cynical and earnestly romantic songs with equal agility. He also wrote a ton of stellar tunes for popular soloists and bands in the 60s and 70s, and to top it off he has a thriving career writing songs for animated movies (not to mention his work composing film scores). Newman is one of the greats, and an absolute lock for this list.