03/02/2022
Remembering Karen Carpenter who was born on this day March 2, 1950 in New Haven, CT.
The family moved in June 1963 to the Los Angeles suburb of Downey CA. after her father was offered a job there by a former business associate. Carpenter entered Downey High School in 1964 at age 14 where she started to play drums. She graduated from Downey High School in the spring of 1967, receiving the John Philip Sousa Band Award, and enrolled as a music major at Long Beach State where she performed in the college choir with her brother Richard.
Carpenter's first band was Two Plus Two, an all-girl trio formed with friends from Downey High.In 1965, Karen, Richard, and his college friend Wes Jacobs, a bassist and tuba player, formed the Dick Carpenter Trio. In mid-1966, they entered the Hollywood Bowl annual Battle of the Bands competition. They played an instrumental version of "The Girl from Ipanema" and their own piece, "Iced Tea". They won the competition on June 24 and were signed by RCA Records. They recorded two instrumentals, but they were not released.
In April 1966, the Carpenters were invited to audition at a session with bassist Joe Osborn. Though she was initially expected to just be the drummer, Karen tried singing and impressed everyone there with her voice. Osborn signed a recording contract with her for his label, Magic Lamp Records; he was not particularly interested in Richard's involvement.
In 1967, along with other musicians, including Gary Sims and John Bettis, the siblings formed the group Spectrum. and recorded many demo tapes in Osborn's garage studio, but were turned down by many labels.
A&M Records finally signed the Carpenters to a recording contract in 1969. Karen started out as both the group's drummer and co-lead singer, and she originally sang all of her vocals from behind the drum set. She sang most of the songs on the band's first album, "Offering" (later retitled "Ticket to Ride"); her brother wrote ten of the album's thirteen songs and sang on five of them.
Their next album, 1970's "Close to You", featured two hit singles: "(They Long to Be) Close to You" and "We've Only Just Begun". They peaked at No. 1 and No. 2, respectively, on the Hot 100.
After reviews complained that the group had no focal point in live shows, Richard and manager Sherwin Bash persuaded her to stand at the microphone to sing the band's hits while another musician played the drums (former Disney Mouseketeer Cubby O'Brien served as the band's other drummer for many years).
In 1979 Karen made a solo album with producer Phil Ramone. The album met with a tepid response from Richard and A&M executives in early 1980 and was shelved by A&M Records co-owner Herb Alpert, in spite of attempts by producer Quincy Jones to convince him to release the solo record after a remix.
A portion of the solo album was commercially released in 1989, when some of its tracks (as remixed by Richard) were included on the album "Lovelines", the final album of previously unreleased material from the Carpenters. In 1996, the complete solo album, titled Karen Carpenter, was finally released.
Carpenter died February 4, 1983 at the age of 32.
