Every Moment Has A Song

(via musicoholics) by Noam Heller

Karen Carpenter’s voice hits you like a ray of warm sun that can just as quickly disappear into a dusky cloud of melancholy. If that cloud happens to rain, her voice is also the velvety cloak to shelter you from the drops. In other words, by listening to Karen, you experience a surreal interlacing of dark and light.

This brilliant drummer and singer formed the musical duo Carpenters, along with her brother, Richard. They toured the world throughout the ’70s and sold over 90 million records during their 14-year career together. But sadly, Karen was struggling with persistent feelings of self-reproach and perfectionism that slowly (and literally) ate away at her. Here is the tragic story behind one of the greatest voices of all time.

Growing Up in Her Brother’s Shadow

Karen Carpenter was born on March 2, 1950, in New Haven, Connecticut. Her only sibling, Richard, was three years older and idolized by their parents, Agnes and Harold. Despite being close in age, the two siblings were worlds apart. Richard spent most of his time playing the piano in the privacy of his room, whereas Karen would be outside playing baseball and goofing around.

It was hard to miss how much her mother favored the young piano prodigy and how little affection she showed her only daughter. They even moved the whole family to California in 1963 to pursue Richard’s music career, which wasn’t a very appealing idea for a 13-year-old who had to leave her friends.

Read more: https://musicoholics.com/first-look/karen-carpenters-independence-slowly-vanished-into-a-haze/2.html?br_t=ed