Your All-American College Show 1969
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Ah am so steel een luv weeth yoo
How cool is that? She come across so sweetly during the interview. Nice seeing her drum even with the lip sync.
Ed
Ed
newvillefan
I Know My First Name Is Stephen
This is one of those classic moments which has been recounted before, particularly in the Coleman book. The camera is close focus on Karen until the second verse, when the pull out reveals her sitting at a drum kit. Today it doesn't seem particularly unusual, but back in those days, I can see why a few people might either raise a smile in amusement or be completely intrigued (or both).
Rick-An Ordinary Fool
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^^I'd say both 
So Richard gets about 30 seconds of airtime on this video and Karen is the center of attraction. Did this video actually air on tv like that or is this an edited video not shown on tv. If this was really the clip that was shown on national tv, I'd say they were not happy that Richard had little air time. It's almost like they were trying to mimic the Ticket to Ride video, close of Karen...etc.. or is it vice versa.
So Richard gets about 30 seconds of airtime on this video and Karen is the center of attraction. Did this video actually air on tv like that or is this an edited video not shown on tv. If this was really the clip that was shown on national tv, I'd say they were not happy that Richard had little air time. It's almost like they were trying to mimic the Ticket to Ride video, close of Karen...etc.. or is it vice versa.
RainyDays
Active Member
It's clear who the camera and the hosts want to see front and center. Who would the viewers want to see as well? The radiant, beautiful and personable sister or the dowdy, average, and boring brother? And she is the lead sister singer, after all.
This clip is a gem and I'm so glad Randy shared this with us. On the brink of something amazing and they'd only just begun.
This clip is a gem and I'm so glad Randy shared this with us. On the brink of something amazing and they'd only just begun.
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Ah am so steel een luv weeth yoo
In just about every way imaginable, Karen completely outclassed Richard. There's no way he can't know that. Richard is absolutely talented - don't get me wrong. I have waxed fanboy about his vocal arrangements. He's not too shabby a player either. Whether I always like his arranging (rhythm only) style, the fact is that he can do it...and he can orchestrate too! Not many can do all of that and Richard absolutely can.
Here's the truth: There are a lot of really good piano players out there, even great ones. Greg Phillinganes, Art Tatum, George Shearing, David Foster, Michael Omartian...etc, etc. There are a lot of good, even great, arrangers out there. David Foster, Michael Omartian, Paul Buckmaster, Jeremy Lubbock, etc. etc. Richard's vocal arrangements are amazing, but there are others just as good or better. Those would include Rod Temperton (not just his stuff with Karen - his stuff with Heatwave, Quincy Jones, and Michael Jackson, is just perfection), Mark Kibble (Take 6), Cedric Dent (former Take 6), Mervyn Warren (former Take 6), Brian Wilson (Beach Boys), and the one who they all learned from, Mr. Gene Puerling (Hi-Lo's, Singers Unlimited), etc., etc. Richard, as amazing as he is in all these areas, IMHO, is no better than any of the above-mentioned people at his crafts.
Karen is singular. IMHO, she is the very best female singer that has ever walked the Earth. Technically, she was the best and few can sell emotion with anywhere near the panache that Karen did. There is, quite simply, no one in her class. Are there singers that are amazingly good? Sure! Gladys Knight, kd lang, Mariah Carey (her first few records - not now), P!nk, Kelly Clarkson - all fantastic female vocalists. Karen easily outclasses them all for the sheer beauty of her voice. Somehow, she was given the most beautiful female voice I'll ever hear and the inherent knowledge of exactly how to use it. Also, she didn't have to do a thing to work for it. She didn't warm up, she didn't study, she didn't get coached...it was just there. If you're Richard, how do you adjust to that? The answer? You don't. You just go with it. Karen was, very much, his meal ticket. He couldn't have made it on his own in Pop music without Karen. Karen made his songs and arrangements marketable. Without them, who knows what he would have been doing. What we can likely assert is that he wouldn't have been "a name". He likely would have been a behind-the-scenes person that no one knew who churned out really nice stuff for choirs or movie scores or the like and he would have been able to make quite a nice living for himself. His sister made him marketable and she allows him, even in death, to be known on a far wider scale than he would have been otherwise.
I hope this isn't the least bit inflammatory; it isn't intended to be. I just felt it needed to be said..
Ed
Here's the truth: There are a lot of really good piano players out there, even great ones. Greg Phillinganes, Art Tatum, George Shearing, David Foster, Michael Omartian...etc, etc. There are a lot of good, even great, arrangers out there. David Foster, Michael Omartian, Paul Buckmaster, Jeremy Lubbock, etc. etc. Richard's vocal arrangements are amazing, but there are others just as good or better. Those would include Rod Temperton (not just his stuff with Karen - his stuff with Heatwave, Quincy Jones, and Michael Jackson, is just perfection), Mark Kibble (Take 6), Cedric Dent (former Take 6), Mervyn Warren (former Take 6), Brian Wilson (Beach Boys), and the one who they all learned from, Mr. Gene Puerling (Hi-Lo's, Singers Unlimited), etc., etc. Richard, as amazing as he is in all these areas, IMHO, is no better than any of the above-mentioned people at his crafts.
Karen is singular. IMHO, she is the very best female singer that has ever walked the Earth. Technically, she was the best and few can sell emotion with anywhere near the panache that Karen did. There is, quite simply, no one in her class. Are there singers that are amazingly good? Sure! Gladys Knight, kd lang, Mariah Carey (her first few records - not now), P!nk, Kelly Clarkson - all fantastic female vocalists. Karen easily outclasses them all for the sheer beauty of her voice. Somehow, she was given the most beautiful female voice I'll ever hear and the inherent knowledge of exactly how to use it. Also, she didn't have to do a thing to work for it. She didn't warm up, she didn't study, she didn't get coached...it was just there. If you're Richard, how do you adjust to that? The answer? You don't. You just go with it. Karen was, very much, his meal ticket. He couldn't have made it on his own in Pop music without Karen. Karen made his songs and arrangements marketable. Without them, who knows what he would have been doing. What we can likely assert is that he wouldn't have been "a name". He likely would have been a behind-the-scenes person that no one knew who churned out really nice stuff for choirs or movie scores or the like and he would have been able to make quite a nice living for himself. His sister made him marketable and she allows him, even in death, to be known on a far wider scale than he would have been otherwise.
I hope this isn't the least bit inflammatory; it isn't intended to be. I just felt it needed to be said..
Ed
newvillefan
I Know My First Name Is Stephen
No one was interested until they became known for Karen's lead vocal sound (the RCA contract amounted to nothing once the record execs heard the instrumental jazz material) and Richard signally failed to make it as a solo artist in the aftermath of her death. Once she was gone, no one really wanted to know (except for TV audiences sympathetic to his plight as a stranded sibling) because that beautiful voice, so fundamental to everything they had built together, was gone. Richard, as talented as he is in many areas, is just not a lead vocalist. His sister was the front of the group (sight and sound) and I think that's the reason his solo efforts post-Carpenters were commercially and critical failures. This 1969 show, broadcast a full year before they were known to the public at large, proves that. Ed Sullivan and that other presenter were fawning all over her. Very cute to watch.
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Ah am so steel een luv weeth yoo
I've heard in various interviews (Your Navy Presents...for example) wherein the interviewer tries to make something of "arrangements" in an effort (likely coaxed) to make Richard and Karen seem equally important. While arrangements really are important, they are rendered useless if the singer singing them can't do it well. Karen made his arrangements fly with the public at large. Without it, Richard is nowhere.
Ed
Ed
That 'other presenter' is none other than Arthur Godfrey, who fronted a TV show called Arthur Godfrey's Talent Scouts, a 50's and '60s show that basically did the American Idol thing long before American Idol.
Harry
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