Ivor Novello awards 2015: Meet James Napier, the backroom hitmaker for Sam Smith and Clean Bandit

He's the hottest name in pop you've never heard of

Andrew Davie (left) and James Napier during the nominations announcement for this year's Ivor Novello awards (PA)

The phone hasn’t stopped ringing since James Napier scooped four Grammys and was named pop’s number one songwriter by US trade bible Billboard.

“I’ve been in the shadows my whole career,” said the unassuming London songwriter who has penned global smashes with Sam Smith and Clean Bandit and is now inching towards the spotlight.

Napier, 30, from Camden, will compete against himself at the Ivor Novello awards next month, after two of his signature tunes were nominated for Most Performed Work at the prestigious songwriters’ ceremony.

Stay With Me, the gospel-inspired ballad he helped Sam Smith craft, which won Song of the Year at the 2015 Grammy awards, is up against Rather Be, the chart-topping dance hit he co-wrote for techno-classical quartet Clean Bandit, which has become ubiquitous through its use on M&S food adverts.

Napier, who has also written songs with dance duo Disclosure, is happy to stay out of the headlines. “I take enormous pleasure in seeing artists go out and sing my songs,” he said. “Or being in the corner of a festival and everyone’s singing along, and no-one knows that you’ve written it.”

Napier caught the songwriting bug when he started playing the piano, aged 14. He told his parents he wouldn’t be going to university because he writing music would be his career. An apprenticeship creating music for an advertising agency in Los Angeles prepared him for a career in pop writing-to-order.

With Stay With Me, he told the story of a lover pleading to extend a one-night stand. Rather Be was inspired by “meeting my wife and that feeling that wherever you are in the world, I’d rather be with you.”

Since the Grammy win, Napier has been bombarded by leading US artists, he declines to name, seeking a sprinkling of his magic.

The shine has not been taken off after it emerged that the writers of Stay With Me had unconsciously coupled the melody of the 1989 track I Won't Back Down by veteran musicians Tom Petty and Jeff Lynne on to their song.

“We were unfamiliar with the song and when it was brought to our attention we had to hold our hands up because there was a similarity in the melody. It was amicably settled.”

He believes that “it’s important that songwriters are properly compensated” by services such as Spotify because “you can work for 10 years without making it…we aren’t actually all living in mansions.”

Napier now has “a few personal songs of my own” which he will debut at the Wild Life festival in Brighton in June, headlined by Smith, under the name Jimmy Napes.

The Novello nominees include FKA Twigs, the girlfriend of the actor Robert Pattinson. The 27 year-old, real name Tahliah Debrett Barnett, is recognised for Two Weeks, which competes for Best Contemporary Song against Rather Be and Every Other Freckle by alt-J.

Presented by the British Academy of Songwriters, Composers and Authors (BASCA), the awards, which are marking their 60th anniversary, are highly prized because they are voted for by songwriters and composers.

But there was surprise over the omission of Ed Sheeran, the UK’s most successful songwriter last year, whose x album sold 6 million copies, from any of the categories.

Paul Gambaccini, the Radio 2 DJ who will present the Grosvenor House awards next month, said: “Each of the categories has its own jury. You’d have to ask the individual jurors why they didn’t choose one of the songs from x.”

The organisers may tempt Sheeran to attend with special “out of competition” award. “There all kinds of combinations and permutations, don’t rule it out,” Gambaccini said.