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Carpenters were an American vocal and instrumental duo, consisting of sister Karen and brother Richard Carpenter. The Carpenters were the #1 selling American music act of the 1970s. Though often referred to by the public as "The Carpenters", the duo's official name on authorized recordings and press materials is simply Carpenters, without the definite article. During a period in the 1970s when louder and wilder rock was in great demand, Richard and Karen produced a distinctively soft musical style that made them among the best-selling music artists of all time.
Carpenters' melodic pop produced a record-breaking run of hit recordings on the American Top 40 and Adult Contemporary charts, and they became leading sellers in the soft rock, easy listening and adult contemporary genres. Carpenters had three #1 singles on the Billboard Hot 100 and fifteen #1 hits on the Adult Contemporary Chart (see The Carpenters discography). In addition, they had twelve top 10 singles (including their #1 hits). To date, Carpenters' album and single sales total more than 100 million units.
During their 14-year career, the Carpenters recorded 11 albums, five of which contained top 10 singles (Close to You, Carpenters, A Song for You, Now & Then and Horizon), thirty-one singles, five television specials, and one short-lived television series. They toured in the United States, the United Kingdom, Japan, Australia, the Netherlands and Belgium. Their recording career ended with Karen's death in 1983 from cardiac arrest following complications of anorexia nervosa. Extensive news coverage of the circumstances surrounding her death increased public awareness of the consequences of eating disorders.
One of the elements that made the music of the Carpenters distinctive was Karen's use of her low register. Though present in jazz and country music, there were few contralto singers in popular music at the time. However, Karen did have a wide vocal range that spanned about three octaves. Richard's voice was said to be very complementary to that of Karen's. Although Karen had great upper range to her voice, they never realized it until she recorded some albums like "Lovelines", so they mostly concentrated on her lower range (or her "basement", as Karen called it). "Both Karen and I felt the magic was in her 'chest voice' (a.k.a. 'basement'). There is no comparison in terms of richness in sound, so I wasn't about to highlight the upper voice", states Richard in the "Fans Ask" section of the Carpenters' official website.
Because Karen's magic was in the "basement", Richard always rearranged cover songs and his own songs in a key that would suit her. Many of the Carpenters' songs are located in the keys of D ("You", "There's a Kind of Hush"), E ("Yesterday Once More"), E flat ("Only Yesterday"), F ("I'll Never Fall in Love Again", "Top of the World"), and G ("And When He Smiles", "Reason to Believe", "For All We Know", "You'll Love Me").
Although he played many keyboard instruments during the band's existence, including grand piano, harpsichord, Hammond organ and synthesizer, Richard is best known as an endorser of Wurlitzer's electric pianos, whose sound he described as "warm" and "beautiful". He would often double his acoustic piano parts with a Wurlitzer in the studio to thicken the sound, creating one of the 1970s' most distinctive keyboard sounds. From the mid-1970s Richard also used Fender Rhodes pianos, often having an acoustic grand as well as both Rhodes and Wurlitzer electric pianos on stage for different songs.
Apart from being a singer, Karen was also an accomplished drummer, and often played the drums on their pre-1974 songs. According to Richard, she considered herself a "drummer who sang". Karen was barely visible behind the drums during live performances. Although unwilling, she and Richard eventually reached a performance compromise: during the ballads she would sing standing and through the lesser known songs she would sit. As the years progressed, demand for Karen's vocals began to overshadow her drumming time, and gradually she played the drums less. By the A Kind of Hush album in 1976, Karen did not play the drums at all.
The Carpenters' arrangements, many done by Richard, are often praised. Most of the arrangements are classical in style, with many strings, and sometimes brass and woodwinds ("Calling Occupants of Interplanetary Craft" used over 160 singers and musicians). Music critic Daniel Levitin called Richard Carpenter "one of the most gifted arrangers to emerge in popular music."
Childhood (1946–1964)
The Carpenters were both born on Hall Street in New Haven, Connecticut, to parents Harold and Agnes. Richard Lynn was born on October 15, 1946, and Karen Anne followed on March 2, 1950. Richard was a quiet child who spent most of his time in the house listening to records and playing the piano. Karen, on the other hand, seemed to be friendly and outgoing; she liked to play sports, including softball with the neighborhood kids, but she also spent a lot of time listening to music.
In June 1963, the Carpenter family moved to the Los Angeles suburb of Downey, California. In the fall of 1964, Richard enrolled at Long Beach State, now known as California State University, Long Beach, where he met future songwriting partner John Bettis, with whom he would write classics like "Top of the World", "Goodbye to Love", and "Only Yesterday"; Wesley Jacobs, a friend who played the bass and tuba for the Richard Carpenter Trio; and Frank Pooler, with whom Richard would collaborate to create the Christmas standard "Merry Christmas Darling" in 1966.
That same fall, Karen enrolled at Downey High School, where she found she had a knack for playing the drums. When Karen joined the marching band, band teacher Bruce Gifford (who had taught Richard in 1963) assigned Karen a glockenspiel, a quiet instrument that Karen highly disliked. In an interview, Karen stated:
I didn't really like it (the glockenspiel) because it's not a very convenient instrument to play, and it's hard to carry.... It's always a quarter-step sharp to the band, which used to drive me crazy!
Shortly after, though, friend and fellow band member Frankie Chavez inspired Carpenter to play the drums. Karen would often borrow Chavez's drum kit when he taught her. "She and Frankie ... must have worked down the rudiments, the cadences, and the press-rolls for hours", recalls Richard. When Karen finally got a Ludwig drum kit from her parents in late 1964, she was able to play it professionally, in what Richard had described in their documentary, Close to You: Remembering the Carpenters as "exotic time signatures".
The Richard Carpenter Trio and Spectrum (1965–1968)
By 1965, Karen had been practicing the drums for a year, and Richard was refining his piano techniques with teacher Frank Pooler. The two started a jazz trio in late 1965 with their friend Wes Jacobs, who played bass and tuba.
The Richard Carpenter Trio signed up for the annual Hollywood Bowl Battle of the Bands in mid-1966, where they played an instrumental version of "The Girl from Ipanema" and their own "Iced Tea". The trio won the Battle of the Bands on June 24, 1966, and they were signed up by RCA Records. They recorded songs such as The Beatles' "Every Little Thing" and Frank Sinatra's "Strangers in the Night" for RCA. However, these recordings were never released (although some tracks were released decades later as part of a boxed set of Carpenters material.)
Later in 1966, Karen tagged along at a late-night session in the garage studio of Los Angeles bassist Joe Osborn, and joined future Carpenters collaborator and lyricist John Bettis at a demo session where Richard was to accompany an auditioning trumpet player. Asked to sing, Karen performed for Osborn, who was so bowled over with her voice that he said `Never mind the trumpet player; this chubby little girl can sing.'
Osborn then signed Karen by herself as a singer to his fledgling label, Magic Lamp Records, and the label put out a single featuring two of Richard's compositions, "Looking for Love" and "I'll Be Yours." The single was not a hit however, and the label soon became defunct. However, Osborn let Karen and Richard continue to use his studio to record demo tapes until 1969, when they finally got an offer from A&M Records.
In 1967, Richard and Karen teamed up with four other student musicians from Long Beach State to form a band called "Spectrum". The group often performed at the Whisky a Go Go. Spectrum member John Bettis worked with the Carpenters until Karen's death in 1983, composing many songs with Richard.
In 1968, Spectrum disbanded, and the Richard Carpenter Trio's Wes Jacobs left for the Detroit Symphony Orchestra. Jacobs, who played both the bass and the tuba, would eventually become the symphony's Principal Tubist in 1970. Richard and Karen received an offer to be on the television program Your All American College Show in mid-1968. Their June 22, 1968 performance was Richard's and Karen's first television appearance.
Richard and Karen sent their demo tapes to many record labels until A&M Records' co-owner and trumpeter/vocalist Herb Alpert (who happened to be a friend of a friend of their mother's) became attracted to their distinct sound. Alpert was Richard's and Karen's lucky break, and his decision would change their lives.
Carpenters (1969–1983)
Richard and Karen Carpenter signed to A&M Records on April 22, 1969, under the name "Carpenters". Since Karen was technically underage (she was 19 at the time), her parents had to co-sign for her. Richard and Karen had decided to sign as "Carpenters", without the definite article. In the album notes for their 2004 release, Carpenters Gold: 35th Anniversary Edition, Richard stated:
After much thought, we decided to name the act "Carpenters" (No "The"; we thought it sounded hipper without it, like Buffalo Springfield or Jefferson Airplane.)
Offering (Ticket to Ride) (1969)
When Richard and Karen Carpenter signed to A&M Records, they were given carte blanche in the recording studio. Their debut album, entitled Offering released in 1969, featured a number of songs that Richard had written or co-written during their Spectrum period. However, the most significant track on the album was a ballad rendition of The Beatles hit "Ticket to Ride", which soon became a minor hit for Carpenters, peaking at #54 on the Billboard Hot 100 and the Top 20 of the Adult Contemporary chart. In an effort to cash in on the success of that track, Offering was repackaged with a different cover under the name Ticket to Ride in 1970.
Close to You (1970)
Despite the lukewarm chart performance of "Ticket to Ride", Richard and Karen persevered and finally achieved success with the Burt Bacharach/Hal David song "(They Long To Be) Close To You", which was released in 1970. It debuted at #56, the highest debut of the week ending June 20, 1970. It rose to #1 on July 25, 1970, and stayed on top of the Billboard Hot 100 for four weeks.
Shortly afterward, Richard had seen a television commercial for Crocker National Bank featuring a song entitled "We've Only Just Begun" written by Paul Williams and Roger Nichols. Richard realized the song's hit potential when he heard it on television and three months after "(They Long To Be) Close To You" reached #1, Carpenters' version of "We've Only Just Begun" reached #2 on the Billboard Hot 100. The song became the first hit single for Williams and Nichols and is considered by Richard Carpenter to be the group's "signature" tune."
"Close to You" and "We've Only Just Begun" became RIAA Certified Gold Singles and were featured on the best-selling album Close To You, which is placed #175 on Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums of All Time.
The duo rounded out the year with the holiday release of "Merry Christmas Darling". The single scored high on the holiday charts in 1970 and made repeated appearances on the holiday charts in subsequent years. In 1978, feeling she could give a more mature treatment to the tune, Karen re-cut the vocal for their Christmas TV special and the song became a hit all over again.
Carpenters and A Song for You (1971–1972)
A string of hit singles and albums kept Carpenters on the charts through the early 1970s. Their 1971 hit "For All We Know" was originally recorded in 1970, by Larry Meredith, for a wedding scene in the movie Lovers and Other Strangers. Upon hearing it in the movie theatre, Richard realized its potential and subsequently recorded it in the autumn of 1970. The track became Carpenters' third gold single.
The duo's fourth gold single "Rainy Days and Mondays" became Williams' and Nichols' second major single with Carpenters, peaking at #2 on the Billboard Hot 100, kept from the top slot only because of Carole King's "It's Too Late". According to Ray Coleman, well-known music industry journalist and biographer, "Rainy Days and Mondays" is arguably one of Carpenters' most popular tracks.
"Superstar" written by Delaney Bramlett and Leon Russell became another Carpenters classic and is acclaimed for Karen's "haunting" vocals on the song. Richard modified the original lyric of "And I can hardly wait to sleep with you again," to "And I can hardly wait to BE with you again." The song is often described as "poignant". The record became the duo's third #2 single on the Billboard Hot 100. Their eponymous album, entitled Carpenters was released in 1971. It became one of their best-selling albums, earning RIAA certification for platinum four times. It won a Grammy Award for Carpenters, as well as three other nominations.
"Goodbye to Love" is the title to an unheard magnum opus in the 1940 Bing Crosby movie Rhythm on the River. Crosby played a songwriter trying to come up with a song called "Goodbye to Love." Although the song's title was mentioned several times in the movie, no such song ever existed. Richard Carpenter happened to see this movie on late-night television one night and decided that it was a great title. He and Bettis wrote the song on a Learjet for his sister Karen to sing. The song was Carpenters' third hit single in 1972, peaking at #7.
"Goodbye to Love" starts off slowly with Karen singing softly a cappella, then builds up to an intense electric guitar solo in the middle. The second verse starts off calmly, then builds up again to a blistering drum and electric guitar fade-out. The fuzz-guitar solo was played by lead guitarist Tony Peluso, who was called personally by Karen herself and asked to play on the song, thereby launching the genre which would come to be known as the power ballad. Peluso recalls that, at the time, he thought someone was playing a joke on him when a woman called and said she was Karen Carpenter. Peluso would ultimately be a part of Carpenters until their end in 1983.
"Top of the World" was the group's biggest country hit. Lynn Anderson had heard the album cut version in 1972 and decided to record her own version. Anderson released her version in early 1973; Richard and Karen debated as to whether or not they should release their version on a single. Gil Friesen, an A&M co-worker, argued that they had released too many records from the A Song for You album already ("Hurting Each Other", "It's Going to Take Some Time", "Goodbye to Love", and later, "I Won't Last a Day Without You"). Regardless, they released "Top of the World" as a single in May 1973 in response to the heavy public demand, and it became Carpenters' second Billboard #1 hit, in December 1973.
Now & Then (1973)
Their Now & Then album from 1973 was named by mother Agnes Carpenter. It contained the popular Sesame Street song "Sing" and the reminiscent "Yesterday Once More".
In 1974, Carpenters achieved a massive international hit with an up-tempo remake of Hank Williams's "Jambalaya (On the Bayou)". While the song was not released as a single in the U.S., it reached the top 30 in Japan, sold well in the United Kingdom, and became their biggest hit of all time in the Netherlands. In late 1974, a Christmas single followed, a jazz-influenced rendition of "Santa Claus Is Coming to Town".
The First World Tour (1974)
The Carpenters did not release a new album in 1974. In Richard's words, "there was simply no time to make one. Nor was I in the mood." The duo also had no Hot 100 top 10 hit in 1974. "Top of the World" was at #11 and dropping on 5 January 1974, while "Please Mr. Postman" was at #11 and rising on 28 December 1974. In between these two singles, the pair released just one Hot 100 single, a Paul Williams/Roger Nichols composition called "I Won't Last a Day Without You". Originally recorded as an album track for their 1972 LP, A Song for You, the Carpenters finally decided to release their original two years after its original LP release and some months after Maureen McGovern's 1973 cover. In March 1974, the single version became the fifth and final selection from that album project to chart in the Top 20, reaching #11 on the Hot 100 on 25 May 1974.
The Singles: 1969-1973 (1974)
In place of the new album for 1974, their first greatest hits package this album was released, featuring new remixes of their prior hit singles, some with a newly-recorded lead, and including newly recorded bridges and transition material so that each side of the album would play through with no breaks, giving the album a little bit of a live-concert feel. Some complete songs were recorded in addition to the aforementioned singles, however, as would happen with their non-Christmas songs recorded in 1978, most of these did not see the light of day until after Karen's passing. These songs were included on "Voice of the Heart", "Lovelines", the Carpenters box set From the Top, and their two outtake albums As Time Goes By and Interpretations.
Their first compilation album was entitled The Singles: 1969-1973 and it topped the charts in the U.S. for one week, on 5 January 1974, and it also topped the United Kingdom chart and became one of the best-selling albums of the decade, ultimately selling more than 7 million copies in the U.S. alone. According to Ray Coleman, The Singles: 1969-1973 went to number one on February 9, 1974, and exited #1 sixteen weeks later, on June 1, 1974, because of Rick Wakeman's Journey to the Centre of the Earth.
Horizon (1975)
In 1975, The Carpenters gained another hit with a remake of The Marvelettes' chart-topping Motown classic from 1961, "Please Mr. Postman". Released in late 1974, the song soared to #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 in January 1975, becoming the duo's third and final #1 pop single. It also earned Karen and Richard their record-setting twelfth million-selling gold single in America.
Richard Carpenter's and John Bettis's song "Only Yesterday" followed "Please Mr. Postman", and peaked at #4. Carpenter and Bettis did not believe that "Only Yesterday" would become a hit single, and bet against Roger Young that it would not enter the top 5. They each lost a thousand dollars to Young.
Both singles appeared on their 1975 LP Horizon, which also included covers of The Eagles' "Desperado" and Neil Sedaka's "Solitaire", which became a moderate hit for the duo that year. Horizon was certified platinum, but owing to the disc's late release (after the second single was already dropping off the charts), it was their first album to fall short of multi-platinum status. Rolling Stone reviewer Stephen Holden acclaimed Horizon, calling it "the Carpenters' most musically sophisticated album to date."
The Carpenters were among the first American recording acts to produce music videos to promote their records. In early 1975, they filmed a performance of "Please Mr. Postman" at Disneyland as well as "Only Yesterday" at the Huntington Gardens.
A Kind of Hush and Passage (1976–1977)
Their subsequent album A Kind of Hush, released on June 11, 1976, achieved gold status, but again owing to its late release, became the first Carpenters album not to become a platinum certified record since Ticket to Ride seven years earlier. Their singles releases in 1976 were successful, but at this time, contemporary hit radio was moving forward with changing musical styles, which ultimately made the careers of most "soft" groups like Carpenters suffer. The duo's biggest pop single that year was a cover of Herman's Hermits' "There's a Kind of Hush (All Over the World)", which peaked at #12 on the Billboard Hot 100. "I Need to Be in Love" (allegedly Karen's favorite song by Carpenters) charted at #25 on the Billboard Hot 100. However, it followed "There's a Kind of Hush" to the top spot on the Adult Contemporary charts and became the duo's 14th #1 Adult Contemporary hit, far and away more than any other act in the history of the chart.
The disco craze was in full swing by 1977, and adult-appeal "easy listening" artists like Carpenters were getting less airplay. Their experimental album, Passage, released in 1977, marked an attempt to broaden their appeal by venturing into other musical genres. The album featured an unlikely mix of Jazz-fusion ("B'wana She No Home"), calypso ("Man Smart, Woman Smarter"), and orchestrated balladry ("I Just Fall in Love Again", "Two Sides"), and included the hits, "All You Get from Love Is a Love Song", "Sweet, Sweet Smile", and "Calling Occupants of Interplanetary Craft". The most notable tracks included cover versions of "Don't Cry for Me, Argentina" (from the rock opera Evita) and Klaatu's "Calling Occupants of Interplanetary Craft (the Recognized Anthem of World Contact Day)", both complete with choral and orchestral accompaniment. Ironically the latter song predated the release of Steven Spielberg's film Close Encounters of the Third Kind by one month. Although the single release of "Calling Occupants" became a minor hit in the United Kingdom, peaking at number 32 on the U.S. pop charts, for the first time a Carpenters album did not reach the gold threshold of 500,000 copies shipped in the United States. The Carpenters' music videos of "All You Get from Love Is a Love Song" and "Calling Occupants of Interplanetary Craft" for the Passage album can be seen on the DVD Gold: Greatest Hits. In early 1978, they scored a surprise Top 10 country hit with the up-tempo, fiddle-sweetened "Sweet, Sweet Smile", written by country-pop singer Juice Newton and her longtime musical partner Otha Young.
The Singles: 1974-1978 (1978)
In place of a new album for 1978, a second compilation, The Singles: 1974-1978, was released however, only in the UK. Meanwhile, in the United States, their first holiday album, Christmas Portrait, proved to be an exception to their faltering career at home and became a seasonal favorite, returning Karen and Richard to platinum status.
During the sessions, several non-holiday songs were also recorded such as Where Do I Go From Here, Slow Dance, and Honolulu City Lights, most of which would not see the light of day until after Karen's passing as a part of numerous albums made up of outtakes.
Brief hiatus, Made in America and Karen's final days
Richard sought treatment for his addiction to quaaludes at a Topeka, Kansas, facility for six weeks starting in January 1979. He then decided to take the rest of the year off for relaxation and rehabilitation. Richard first sought refuge at the home of his bandmate Gary Sims, before moving into the apparent anonymity of one of their apartment blocks bought at the outset of their career. Richard would live there for the next seven years, during Karen's treatment in New York, after her death and beyond it. Karen, at this point neither wanting to take a break from singing nor seek help for her anorexia, decided to pursue a solo album project with renowned producer Phil Ramone in New York. The choice of maverick record producer Ramone and more adult-oriented and disco/dance-tempo material represented an effort to retool her image. By spring 1980, the album was finished and the customary playback for record executives was booked. The album had already been assigned a catalogue number and stunning new artwork and photos of Karen taken for the cover. Staff at A&M were were prepared for its release and it was being talked up as a summer blockbuster for the label. Reaction to an earlier playback in New York had been fantastic, with champagne flowing and an ecstatic Karen jumping up and down. Playback in California, for Richard and A&M Executives met with a very different reaction. Song after song, the room was silent and the subsequent decision from the executives was unanimous: it had to be cancelled. Outside of the meeting, Karen crumpled in her producer's arms, devastated at the rejection. To add insult to injury, A&M Records confirmed that the debt for its production (more than half a million dollars) would be charged against Carpenters' future royalties.
Angry, but for the most part undismayed by the decision, Karen proceeded with plans to record a new album with her brother, who had now recovered from his addiction and was ready to go. Karen's solo album Karen Carpenter, went unreleased until October 1996, although Karen's fans got a taste of the album in 1989 when four of its tracks, "Lovelines", "If We Try", "Remember When Lovin' Took All Night" and "If I Had You", turned up, albeit remixed by Richard, on their third posthumous album Lovelines. "If I Had You" was released as a single and reached the Top 20 on the Adult Contemporary chart. Two further tracks were drip fed to fans on the duo's box set 'From The Top'.
The Carpenters produced a final television special in 1980 called Music, Music, Music!, with guest stars Ella Fitzgerald, Suzanne Somers, and John Davidson. This event was filmed the same year Karen married Tom Burris, and she had temporarily returned to a healthier weight. However, ABC was not at all happy with their special, as it was just music from start to finish, unlike the previous specials which included sketch-based comedy. ABC felt it was too much like a PBS program.
On June 16, 1981, the Carpenters released what would become their final LP as a duo, Made in America. Happy to see his favourite duo return to the fold, Herb Alpert hosted a 'Welcome Back' party for them on the lawns at the lot of A&M Records. The album sold only around 200,000 copies before Karen's death in 1983; however, it did spawn a final top 20 pop single, the romantic "Touch Me When We're Dancing", which reached #16 on the Hot 100. It also became their fifteenth number one Adult Contemporary hit. Promotion for the album included a whistle-stop tour of America, Brazil and Europe, preceded by a disastrous live appearance for a Japanese Telethon event, filmed outdoors on the lot of A&M in August 1981. During their segment (the last of the show) and in the uncomfortably hot sunshine, the playback audio cut out midway through their performance of 'Touch Me When We're Dancing'. The ensuing scenes, coupled with Karen's furious reaction, left it obvious to viewers that the whole band had been miming live on TV. Three further singles from the album failed to ignite the charts, with its final selection 'Beechwood 4-5789' being released on Karen's birthday on March 2, 1982.
Karen's personal troubles dimmed the prospects of this modest return to the charts. After a whirlwind romance, Karen married real estate developer Thomas James Burris in a lavish wedding held in the Crystal Room of the Beverly Hills Hotel on August 31, 1980. A new song performed by Karen at the ceremony, "Because We Are in Love", surfaced in 1981 on Made in America (as well as the B-side of "Touch Me When We're Dancing"). By late 1981, though, with marriage troubles brewing and Karen firmly in the grip of anorexia, her physical appearance had changed drastically. Friends she visited did not recognise her and promotional TV appearances revealed her to be shockingly thin. The music videos produced to promote the Made in America album were ample evidence that Karen was now seriously ill. Vindicating the earlier views of many of her close friends, Karen's husband Tom Burris had also turned out not to be what he represented financially, at times demanded sums of up to $30,000 from her to keep his business dealings afloat. Knowing full well of Karen's wish to start a family, Tom had also deliberately concealed from her the fact that he had previously had a vasectomy, a fact which Karen only found out days before her wedding. Telephoning her mother beside herself, telling her that the wedding was off, Karen's mother replied, "The invites have gone out, People Magazine is going to be there. You made your bed, now you have to lie in it. You will walk down that aisle."
By November 1981, Karen's marriage reached a breaking point and after a family dinner, Karen and Tom returned to their parents' home in Downey and after a heated row upstairs, Tom announced to her perplexed parents "You can keep her," and stormed out. Shortly after this, Karen resolved to deal with her eating disorder and sought therapy with noted psychotherapist Steven Levenkron in New York City. Attending therapy sessions for an hour a day, Karen attempted to deal with her problem head on, but it was not without its complications. On one occasion, Karen admitted to her therapist that she was ingesting up to 100 laxatives a day. More alarmingly, Levenkron found out she was taking ten times the normal daily dose of thyroid medication, despite having a normal thyroid, in order to speed up her metabolism. Horrified by this revelation, he demanded she bring the bottle to him the following day and it remains in his drawer to this day. As Karen's self-imposed deadline of a year in therapy drew nearer, events took a frightening turn in September 1982 when she called her therapist to say her heart was beating funny and she felt dizzy and confused. Admitting herself into hospital, Karen was hooked up to an intravenous drip and had 30 pounds in weight put back on her. By November 1982, Karen left the hospital and despite pleas from family and friends, announced that she was returning home to California and that she was cured. Karen's last public appearance was in December, when she performed at her godparents' school in Sherman Oaks, CA, singing Christmas songs.
Several events between November 1982 and February 1983 caused family and friends to conclude that all was still not well with Karen. Richard insisted that although she had marvellous, big brown eyes, there was no life left in them. Raising the red flag to their long term advisor Werner Wolfen, he subsequently reported this back to Karen, who became furious. Calling a perplexed Richard to a meeting with Werner there and then, she reiterated that she had supported her brother through his difficulties with quaaludes and that he should do the same for her. They called a truce, but she reckoned without her brother's grim conviction of the truth. Karen also complained to friends about her concerns over her thumping heart and spots before her eyes. Alarmed, they wanted to tell her mother about such episodes but Karen allayed their fears and told them she would tell Agnes herself. She never did.
Karen's sudden death
Without the usual customary phone call to say she was on her way, Karen's red Jaguar swung into the driveway of her parents' Newville Avenue home on the afternoon of February 3, 1983. Karen told her mother of her need to buy a new washing machine and other plans she had for the following day and ultimately decided to spend the evening with her parents, watching a rerun of Shogun and talking with friends on the telephone, including the producer of her shelved solo album, Phil Ramone. The following morning, her mother Agnes heard Karen come down to hook up the coffee machine before returning upstairs. Agnes arose and came downstairs and dialled Richard's room where Karen had been sleeping to call her down to breakfast, but did not receive an answer. After shouting her name twice more with no response, Agnes went up the steps and found her daughter lying unresponsive on the floor of the walk-in closet. Screaming for Harold to call paramedics, Agnes then called Richard, who raced to the house. By the time he arrived, his sister was already in an ambulance. Noting Richard's distressed state, paramedics advised him to drive very carefully if he planned to follow the ambulance. Richard would later say that his hope at the time was that she had merely passed out, they would be able to revive her and that she would see the error of her ways. It was not to be. After spending 20 minutes in a waiting room, a doctor entered to tell Richard and his parents the grim news: at the age of just 32, Karen was dead. She was scheduled to sign her divorce papers later that day.
Karen Carpenter did not die from anorexia itself, but from sinister side-effects of the disease. After toying with her body for several years, her heart could not take the strain of a long period of poor eating habits followed by rapid weight gain. The autopsy stated that Karen's death was caused by emetine cardiotoxicity resulting from anorexia nervosa. Under the anatomical summary, the first item was heart failure, with anorexia as second. The third finding was cachexia, which is extremely low weight and weakness and general body decline associated with chronic disease. Emetine cardiotoxicity suggested that Karen abused ipecac syrup, used medically to induce vomiting in patients who have ingested poison, but which taken in quantities actually is a poison in itself. Ipecac was easily obtainable at the time and for a long time after her death there was no evidence to suggest that Karen abused it.. Richard insisted that he had never seen any toxicology report supporting the use of ipecac, but since the publication of the Coleman account of their story in 1994, the long-lost toxicology report has surfaced, proving that Karen's heart had been damaged by the use of ipecac and previous use of synthoid, which Karen took in quantities to race her heart to burn off more calories. What no one could have anticipated was that between Karen leaving New York in November 1982 and the following February, Karen's sustained, secretive use of ipecac (to replace the laxatives Steven Levenkron had successfully weaned her off) meant that she had accidentally poisoned herself within just three months of leaving her therapist's care.
Between her death on February 4 and her funeral service on Tuesday, February 8, 1983, at the Downey United Methodist Church, Karen's body lay in state at Forest Lawns Memorial Park in an open white casket. Karen was dressed in a pink suit and mourners and fans turned up to pay their last respects. At her funeral, more than a thousand mourners turned up, among them her friends Dorothy Hamill, Olivia Newton-John, Petula Clark, Dionne Warwick and Herb Alpert. Prior to the funeral, Karen's husband Tom Burris had thrown his wedding ring into the casket. The Carpenters: the Untold Story).
On October 12, 1983, the Carpenters received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, a few yards from the Kodak Theater. Richard, Harold, and Agnes Carpenter attended the inauguration, as did many fans.
Karen's death brought lasting media attention to anorexia nervosa and also to bulimia. Karen's death encouraged celebrities to go public about their eating disorders, among them Tracey Gold and later, Diana, Princess of Wales. Medical centers and hospitals began receiving increased contacts from people with these disorders. The general public had little knowledge of anorexia and bulimia prior to her death, making the conditions difficult to identify and treat.
In December 2003, the remains of Karen and her parents were exhumed from Forest Lawn Memorial Park, Cypress, California, and reinterred in Pierce Brothers Valley Oaks Memorial Park in Westlake Village, California, in the presence of her brother and his wife (and first cousin) Mary. She is buried with her parents in a pink marble tomb valued at around $600,000, which bears the Carpenter family name in gold lettering across its top.
Following Karen's death, Richard Carpenter has continued to produce recordings of the duo's music, including several albums of previously unreleased material and numerous compilation albums. Voice of the Heart, an album that included some finished tracks left out of Made In America and earlier LPs, was released in late 1983. It peaked at #46 and was certified Gold. Two singles were released. "Make Believe It's Your First Time", a second version of a song Karen had recorded for her solo album (and a song which had been a minor hit in 1979 for Bobby Vinton), reached #7 Adult Contemporary but only reached #101 on the pop side. "Your Baby Doesn't Love You Anymore" got to #12 Adult Contemporary. Richard Carpenter married his first cousin, Mary Rudolph, on May 19, 1984. Kristi was born on August 17, 1987, Traci on July 25, 1989, Mindi Karen (named after her late aunt) on July 7, 1992, followed by Colin and Taylor.
For the second Christmas season following Karen's death, Richard constructed a "new" Carpenters Christmas album entitled, An Old-Fashioned Christmas, using outtake material from the duo's first Christmas album (Christmas Portrait) and recording new material around it.
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