Tormented daughter of Burt Bacharach commits suicide

Nikki Bacharach, who had spent years battling the brain disorder Asperger's syndrome, took her own life on Thursday night at her apartment in Thousand Oaks, California.

She died of suffocation using a plastic bag and helium, according to the coroner's office.

Mr Bacharach's spokeswoman Linda Dozoretz said: "She quietly and peacefully committed suicide to escape the ravages to her brain brought on by Asperger's.

"She loved kitties and earthquakes, glacial calving, meteor showers, science, blue skies and sunsets, and Tahiti."

Her 78-year-old father cancelled all his performing commitments until July, saying he was suffering from a shoulder injury.

Born prematurely in 1966, Lea Nikki Bacharach spent the first three months of her life in an incubator.

Her father, who won Oscars for composing Raindrops Keep Fallin' On My Head and Arthur's Theme, also wrote a song called Nikki about his daughter in 1969, when the full extent of her disorder was becoming clear.

It is best known as an instrumental but lyrics were written, including the touching chorus:

"Nikki, it's you

Nikki, where can you be?

It's you, no one but you for me

I've been so lonely since you went away

I won't spend a happy day

Til you're back in my arms."

The song was used as the theme for US TV network ABC's Movie of the Week slot.

He wrote a string of other hits, including What The World Needs Now is Love, Magic Moments, Twenty Four Hours From Tulsa, Walk On By, Always Something There To Remind Me and What's New Pussycat?

Nikki studied geology at Cal Lutheran University. With her father's support, she managed to complete the degree. But she could not pursue a career in the field because of poor eyesight.

Sufferers of Asperger's syndrome, a type of autism, have difficulty understanding other people's perspectives and often have narrow interests.

Nikki was the only child of Mr Bacharach and Angie Dickinson, 75, his second wife, whom he married in 1965.

Miss Dickinson, who got her big break playing opposite John Wayne in Rio Bravo and starred in the TV show Police Woman, met the songwriter in New York and agreed to come with him to London while he composed the score for the film What's New Pussycat? Ten weeks later they were married.

She said in a 1993 interview: "Marriage was wonderful for the first week and then good for about ten or 11 years. I read about the first affair he had in the newspapers.

"He said it was nonsense but I knew it was true. And, of course, he had many more.

"Why didn't I leave him after the first one? I suppose I blocked it out. It would have been different if I'd opened the door and found him in bed with another woman.

"But when you don't actually see it happening, you try not to think about it."

The couple divorced in 1980.

Of her daughter Nikki, she said: "When you almost lose a child you hold on to it even more tightly and I guess I over-compensated. I spoiled her badly."

Mr Bacharach married songwriter Carole Bayer Sager in 1982 but they divorced in 1991.

He has three other children. He adopted a son, Christopher, 21, with Carole and has two children, Oliver, 14, and Raleigh, 11, with his fourth wife, Jane Hansen.