 The Carpenters were an American vocal and instrumental duo consisting of siblings Karen and Richard Carpenter. Producing a distinctively soft musical style, they became one of the best-selling music artists of all time. During their 14-year career, the Carpenters recorded 11 albums, 31 singles, 5 television specials, and a short-lived television series. Their career ended in 1983 by Karen's death from heart failure brought on by complications of anorexia. Extensive news coverage surrounding the circumstances of her death increased public awareness of eating disorders. The duo's brand of 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. The Carpenters had three number-one singles and five number-two singles on the Billboard Hot 115 number-one hits on the adult contemporary chart. In addition, they had twelve top ten singles. To date, the Carpenters' album and single sales total more than 100 million units. Musical and Lyrical Style Richard Carpenter was the creative force behind the Carpenters' sound. An accomplished keyboard player, composer and arranger, Richard Carpenter was called by music critic Daniel Levitan one of the most gifted arrangers to emerge in popular music. In a period when contemporary music was dominated by heavy rock, their smooth harmonies were not in step with the trends of the day.The sound the Carpenters were going for was rich and melodic, along the same vein as the harmonies found in their contemporaries The Beach Boys and The The Mamas and The Papas, but with greater fullness and orchestration. Most of Richard's arrangements were classical in style, with frequent use of strings and occasional brass and woodwind instruments as well. Richard's work with Karen was heavily influenced by the music of Les Paul, whose overdubbing of the voice of partner Mary Ford allowed her to be used as both the lead and harmonizing vocals. By use of multi-tracked recordings, Richard was able to use Karen and himself for the harmonies to back Karen's lead. The overdubbed background harmonies were distinctive to the Carpenters, but it was the soulful, engaging sound of Karen's lead voice that made them so recognizable. Karen did not possess a powerful singing voice, but close-miking brought out many nuances in her performances. Richard Coles, a musician and broadcaster, commented, No singer is so closely miked up so unforgivingly as Karen Carpenter. That is frightening for singers because the closer the microphone the more unforgiving it is in exposing the weaknesses in a singer's voice. Karen's lower register was warm and distinctive. Richard arranged their music to take advantage of the qualities of said lower register, even if Karen's full vocal range spanned over three octaves. Many of the Carpenters' songs are in the keys of D, U, there's a kind of hush, all over the world, E-flat, only yesterday, E, hurting each other, yesterday once more, F, I'll never fall in love again, and G, and when he smiles, reason to believe, for all we know, you'll love me. Richard is best known for his use of the whirlitzer electric piano, whose sound he described as warm and beautiful. He also played the grand piano, Hammond organ, synthesizer, and even the harpsichord with the band. In the recording studio, he often would overdub his acoustic piano parts with a whirlitzer electric piano to thicken the sound. From the mid-1970s, Richard also used Fender Rhodes pianos. While touring, he often would have a grand piano as well as both a Rhodes and a whirlitzer electric piano on stage for different songs. Karen was an accomplished drummer and initially only played drums, but soon began to sing for the group in addition to playing the drums. Before 1974, Karen played the drums for all their songs. According to Richard, she considered herself a drummer who sang.However, while Karen's vocals soon became the centerpiece of the group's performances, at 5 feet 4 inches tall, performing behind her drum kit made it difficult for audiences to see her. It was soon apparent to Richard and their manager that the audience wanted to see more of Karen. Although unwilling, she eventually agreed to sing the ballads standing up front, returning to her drums for the lesser known songs. As the group's popularity increased, demand for Karen's vocals overshadowed her drumming. Gradually, she played the drums less. By the time their album A Kind of Hush was released in 1976, she had not played the drums for the studio sessions at all, though she continued to play some during concerts. From spring 1976 onward, the tours would include a drum medley for Karen to play, and a piano solo number was included for Richard. Karen made a final return to studio drumming for the track When It's Gone, It's Just Gone, on the album Made in America, albeit in tandem with Nashville session drummer Larry London. She also provided percussion in tandem with Pauline Hoda Costa on the song Those Good Old Dreams. Pre-Carpenters 1946-1964, Childhood The Carpenters were both born at Grace New Haven Hospital, now called Yale New Haven Hospital, in New Haven, Connecticut, to parents Harold and Agnes. Richard Lynn was born on October 15, 1946, and Karen Ann 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, was 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 California State College at Long Beach where he met future songwriter partner John Bettis, 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 SFN Coleman 1994 P equals 51. Friend and fellow band member Frankie Chavez inspired Karen to play the drums. She 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. 1965-1968, The Richard Carpenter Trio and Spectrum. By 1965, Karen had been practicing the drums for a year, and Richard was refining his piano techniques with Pooler as his teacher. In late 1965 Richard teamed up with classmate and friend Wes Jacobs, who played tuba and stand-up bass. With his sister playing drums, the three formed a jazz trio. In mid-1966 the Richard Carpenter trio entered the Hollywood Bowl annual Battle of the Bands. They played an instrumental version of The Girl from Eponema and their own piece titled Iced Tea. The trio won the Battle of the Bands on June 24, 1966, and 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. An RCA committee reviewed their recordings and chose not to produce them, and the Richard Carpenter trio were released from RCA. In 1991, some 25 years later, a couple of these recordings were released as part of a from the top boxed set of Carpenter's material. Later in 1966, Karen tagged along at a late night session in the garage studio of Los Angeles bassist Joe Osborne, and joined future Carpenter's collaborator and lyricist John Bettis at a demo session where Richard was to accompany an auditioning trumpet player. Ask to sing, Karen performed for Osborne, who said never mind the trumpet player, this chubby little girl can sing. Osborne 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, and the label soon became defunct. However, Osborne let Karen and Richard continue to use his studio to record demo tapes. In 1967, Richard and Karen teamed up with four other student musicians from Long Beach State to form a band called Spectrum.SFN Coleman 1994 P equals 63 The group often performed at the whisky ago go SFN Coleman 1994 P equals 54 Spectrum member John Bettis worked with the Carpenter's until Karen's death in 1983, composing many songs with Richard. In 1968, Spectrum disbanded, and Wes Jacobs of the Richard Carpenter trio left for the Detroit Symphony Orchestra. Richard and Karen received an offer to be on the television program Your All-American College show in mid-1968. Their performance of June 22, 1968, was Richard's and Karen's first television appearance, with bassist Bill Sisoyev recruited for this appearance and their other appearances on the show in 1968.During this time, Richard and Karen continued to refine their craft and produced demo tapes in Joe Osborne's garage. One of these was heard by Ondem Records Herb Alpert, who was intrigued by Karen's voice. The Ondem CEO owner signed them to a record contract. Said Richard, we signed with Ondem. In came Herb and he shook our hands and said in so many words it was a pleasure to meet you. Let's hope we have some hits. 1969 1983, Carpenter's Richard and Karen Carpenter signed to Ondem Records on April 22, 1969, under the name Carpenter's. Since Karen was technically underage, she was 19 at the time, her parents had to see a sign for her SFN Colman 1994 P equals 76 Richard and Karen had decided to sign as Carpenter's, without the definite article. Karen said they had been influenced in the name by the pop music group Bread. In the album notes for their 2004 release, Carpenter's Gold, 35th anniversary edition, Richard stated. Another Carpenter-Bettis composition, Top of the World, was originally intended as strictly an album cut, but when Lynn Anderson scored a hit with the song in early 1973, the Carpenter's opted to record their own single version. It was released in September 1973 and became the Carpenter's second Billboard number one hit, in December 1973. Now and Then There Now and Then album from 1973 was named by mother Agnes Carpenter. It contained the popular Sesame Street song Sing and the Ambitious yesterday once more, a side-long tribute to Oldies Radio which incorporated renditions of eight hit songs from previous decades into a faux Oldies radio program. The single version of the track became their biggest hit in the United Kingdom, holding the number two spot for two weeks, it was kept off the top first by Gary Glitter's I'm the Leader of the Gang, I Am, and then by Donnie Osman's version of Young Love. In 1974, the Carpenter's achieved a sizable international hit with an up-tempo remake of Hank Williams's Jumbalaya, on the Bayou. While the song was not released as a single in the US, it reached the top 30 in Japan, number 12 in the United Kingdom, as part of a double A side with Mr. Guter, and number three in the Netherlands. In late 1974, a Christmas single followed, a jazz-influenced rendition of Santa Claus's Coming to Town. The Singles, 1969-1973. The Carpenter's did not record a new album in 1974. The group had been touring extensively and the principles were exhausted. In Richard's words, there was simply no time to make one. Nor was I in the mood. During this period, the pair released just one hot 100 single, a Paul William Shroger Nichols composition called I Won't Last a Day Without You. Taken from their 1972 LP A Song for You, the Carpenter's 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 number 11 on the hot 100 on May 25, 1974. Since Top of the World was at number 11 and falling in 1974's first week and Please Mr. Postman was at number 11 and rising in 1974's last week, the Carpenter's failed all three times, by one position each time, that year to reach the top 10. In place of the new album for 1974, their first greatest hits package was released, featuring new remixes of their prior hit singles, some with a newly recorded lead, and including newly recorded bridges and transition materials so that each side of the album would play through with no breaks, something that Richard would come to regret. This compilation was entitled The Singles, 1969-1973 and topped the charts in the US for one week, on January 5, 1974. It also topped the United Kingdom chart for 17 weeks, non-consecutive, and became one of the best-selling albums of the decade, ultimately selling more than 7 million copies in the US alone. Horizon In 1975, the Carpenter's 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 number one on the Billboard Hot 100 in January 1975, becoming the duo's third and final number one pop single. It also earned Karen and Richard their record-setting 12th million-selling gold single in America. The Carpenter-Bettis composition only yesterday followed Please Mr. Postman as the duo's last Hot 100 top ten hit, reaching number four. Both singles appeared on their 1975 LP Horizon, which also included covers of The Eagles' Desperado and Neil Siddocca'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. The Carpenter's 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 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 Carpenter's 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 caused the careers of most soft groups like the Carpenter's to 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 number 12 on the Billboard Hot 100. I Need to Be in Love, Karen's favorite song by the Carpenter's, charted at number 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 number one adult contemporary hit, far and away more than any other act in the history of the chart. The Carpenter's very first television special aired on December 8, 1976, and went to number 6 on the Nielsen's.Another television special, The Carpenter's at Christmas, aired on December 9, 1977. The disco craze was in full swing by 1977, and adult appeal easy listening artists like the Carpenter's 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-Wanna-She-No-Home, Calypso, Mansmart, 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. Calling Occupants was supported with the TV special Space Encounters, which aired May 17, 1978 with guest stars Suzanne Summers and John Davidson. Although the single release of Calling Occupants became a significant Top 10 hit in the United Kingdom and reached number one in Ireland, it only peaked at number 32 on the US pop charts, and for the first time a Carpenter's album did not reach the gold threshold of 500,000 copies shipped in the United States. 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 Atha Young. The Singles, 1974-1978. In place of a new album for 1978, a second compilation, The Singles, 1974-1978 was released in the UK. In the United States, their first Christmas album, Christmas Portrait, became a seasonal favorite, returning Karen and Richard to platinum status. It was shortly followed by The Carpenter's, A Christmas Portrait, a television special which aired December 19, 1978. During the sessions, several non-Christmas songs were also recorded such as Where Do I Go From Here, Slow Dance, and Honolulu City Lights, most of which were not released until after Karen's death. Brief Hiatus. Richard sought treatment for his addiction to Quailudes at Atapica, Kansas, facility for six weeks starting in January 1979. He then decided to take the rest of the year off for relaxation and rehabilitation. 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 Ramone and more adult-oriented and disco dance tempo material represented an effort to retool her image. The album was finished by spring 1980, but Richard and Ondem executives voted to reject it which reportedly devastated Karen. The eponymous album was finally released 13 years after Karen's death, in 1996. Made in America and Karen's final days. Karen proceeded with plans to record a new album with her brother, who had now recovered from his addiction and was ready to continue their career. The Carpenters produced their final television special in 1980, called Music, Music, Music, with guest stars Ella Fitzgerald and John Davidson. However, ABC was not happy with the special as it was 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. The album sold around 200,000 copies and spawned a final top 20 pop single, Touch Me When We're Dancing, which reached number 16 on the Hot 100. It also became their 15th and final number one adult contemporary hit. The album also produced three other singles, including, Want You, Back in My Life Again, Those Good Old Dreams, and a remake of the Motown hit Beachwood 4-5789. The singles fared well on the adult contemporary charts. Beachwood 4-5789, the last single by the Carpenters to be released in Karen's lifetime, was released on her 32nd birthday. 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 Ondem in August 1981. During their segment, the last of the show, the playback audio cut out midway through their performance of Touch Me When We're Dancing. The ensuing scenes, along with Karen's reaction, left it obvious to viewers that the whole band had been miming. Three further singles from the album failed to ignite the charts. Karen sought therapy for her eating disorder with noted psychotherapist Stephen Lavenkrone in New York City. In September 1982, she called her therapist to say her heart was beating funny and she felt dizzy and confused. Admitting herself into hospital later that month, Karen was hooked up to an intravenous drip, she ended up gaining in eight weeks. In November 1982, Karen left the hospital and despite pleas from family and friends, she announced that she was returning home to California and that she was cured. Karen's Death On February 3, 1983, Karen visited her parents. The following morning, February 4, her mother found her lying unresponsive on the floor of a walk-in closet. After they spent 20 minutes in a waiting room, a doctor entered to tell Richard and his parents that Karen was dead. 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 catechia, which is extremely low weight and weakness and general body decline associated with chronic disease. Emetine cardiotoxicity implied that Karen abused Ipacac syrup, although there was no evidence to suggest that Karen abused it as her brother and family never found Ipacac vials in her apartment, even after her death. At her funeral, more than a thousand mourners attended, among them her friends Dorothy Hamill, Olivia Newton John, Petula Clark, Dionne Warwick and Herb Alpert. On October 12, 1983, the Carpenters received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, a few yards from the Dolby Theatre. Richard, Harold and Agnes Carpenter attended the inauguration, as did many fans. Karen's death brought media attention to anorexia nervosa and also to bulimia. 1983–present, Post Carpenters Following Karen's death, Richard 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 off of Made in America and earlier LPS, was released in late 1983. It peaked at number 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 number 7 Adult Contemporary but only reached number 101 on the pop side. Your Baby Doesn't Love You Anymore got to number 12 Adult Contemporary. For the second Christmas season following Karen's death, Richard constructed a new Carpenter's 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. Richard Carpenter married his first cousin, Mary Rudolph, on May 19, 1984. Christy Lynn, which was the name Karen had chosen for a daughter if she ever had one, Little Girl Blue was born on August 17, 1987, Tracy Tatum on July 25, 1989, Mindy Karen, named after her late aunt, on July 7, 1992, followed by Colin Paul and Taylor Mary. Richard, Mary and their four daughters and one son live in Thousand Oaks, California, where the couple are supporters of the arts. In 2004, Carpenter and his wife pledged a $3 million gift to the Thousand Oaks Civic Arts Plaza Foundation in memory of Karen Carpenter. More recently, Richard has actively supported the Carpenter Performing Arts Center at his alma mater, California State University, Long Beach. He continues to make concert appearances, including fund-raising efforts for the Carpenter Center. In 2007 and 2009, the current owners of the former Carpenter family home on Newville Avenue in Downey, obtained permits from the city to tear down the existing buildings on the site to make room for newer and larger structures, in spite of ongoing protests from fans. In February 2008, a group of fans got their protest campaign covered in the Los Angeles Times. At that time an adjacent house that had once served as the band's headquarters and recording studio had already been demolished and the main house was on the verge of being demolished as well. The original house was immortalized on the now and then album cover and was the place where Karen Carpenter died. In the words of one fan, this was our version of Graceland. Logo. In 1971, the Ondem Graphics Department hired Craig Braun and associates to design the album cover for their third album, entitled Carpenters. I recognized it to be a great logo as soon as I saw it, says Richard.In addition, the logo was used on every Carpenter's album since the third one as said by Richard, to keep things consistent, though, every Carpenter's album from the logo's inception shows the logo. The logo did not appear on the front cover of their album passage but a small version appeared on the back cover. Promotion and Touring. Although the Carpenters had a rough start in 1969 with the lukewarm reviews of their first album, offering, they tried to promote themselves by being Bert Backerach's opening performance. In a live concert in 1974 at the Riviera Hotel, Las Vegas, Karen Carpenter explained. Then, Richard took over, and said. Quote He wanted us to put together a medley of his songs, any tunes of his that we wanted to do, and it took a couple of months. We arrived at eight tunes. The medley eventually was abridged and released on their eponymous album Carpenters in 1971. The song was shortened from almost 13 minutes to five minutes. The band maintained a demanding schedule of concert tours and television appearances. Among their numerous television credits were appearances on such popular series as the Ed Sullivan Show, the Tonight Show starring Johnny Carson, the Carol Burnett Show in 1971 and 1972, the Mike Douglas Show in 1971, and the Johnny Cash Show, also in 1971, where they played their hits for all we know and rainy days and Mondays. The duo appeared in a television special on the BBC in 1971 where they performed songs live. They were also the featured performers in a summer replacement series, Make Your Own Kind of Music, which aired on NBC every Tuesday at 8pm. In the United States. Both Karen and Richard would later state in a 1980 radio interview that they were often taken advantage of in their dealings with television during the early 70s and wanted more control in the production of future projects. In May 1973, the Carpenters accepted an invitation to perform at the White House for President Richard Nixon and visiting West German Chancellor Willie Brandt. The Carpenters played numerous concerts from 1971 to 1975. By the mid-1970s, extensive touring and lengthy recording sessions had begun to take their toll on the duo and contributed to their professional and personal difficulties during the latter half of the decade. Karen dieted obsessively and developed the disorder anorexia nervosa, which first manifested itself in 1975 when she collapsed during a show in Las Vegas. Exhausted, Karen was forced to cancel concert tours in the Philippines, UK and Japan. Richard has said that he regrets the six- and seven-day work schedules of that period, adding that had he known then what he knows now, he wouldn't have agreed to it. Karen looked noticeably thin although not sickly in the music video produced for the only yesterday single. Richard developed an addiction to Quailudes, which began to affect his performance in the late 1970s and led to the end of the duo's live concert appearances in 1978. Public Image The Carpenters' popularity often confounded critics. With their output focused on ballads and mid-tempo pop, the duo's music was often dismissed by critics as being bland and saccharine. The recording industry, however, bestowed awards on the duo, who won three Grammy Awards during their career, Best New Artist, and Best Pop Performance by a duo, group or chorus, four, they longed to be, close to you in 1970, and Best Pop Performance by a duo or group for their eponymous LP Carpenters in 1971. In 1974, the Carpenters were voted favorite pop-rock band, duo or group at the first annual American Music Awards. Richard would often state in interviews that many critics usually judged them to drink milk, eat apple pie and take showers. In Coleman's The Carpenters, the untold story, Richard stressed repeatedly how much he disliked the on-dem executives for making their image squeaky clean, and the critics for criticizing them for their image rather than their music. In a documentary about The Carpenters, musician and songwriter Paul Williams stated the duo was often labeled as being too vanilla. Williams supported them by saying, �Yes, but what an exquisite flavor vanilla is.� Legacy Karen Carpenter has been called one of the best female vocalists of all time by influential media as diverse as Rolling Stone magazine and National Public Radio, and Paul McCartney called her the best female vocalist ever, saying that she was the best female voice in the world, melodic, tuneful and distinctive. A critical re-evaluation of Carpenters occurred during the 1990s and 200s with the making of several documentaries produced in the United States, Japan and Great Britain, like Close to You, Remembering the Carpenters, United States, The Sayonara, Japan and Only Yesterday, The Carpenters Story, Great Britain. It has been said that Karen's signature vocals help spur more contralto singers into pop music such as Ann Murray, Rita Coolidge and Melissa Manchester. Despite contentions that their sound was too soft to fall under the definition of rock and roll, major campaigns and petitions exist toward inducting Carpenters in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. In 1990, the alternative rock band Sonic Youth recorded tunic, song for Karen, which depicted Karen saying goodbye to relatives as she got to play the drums again and meet her new friends Dennis Wilson, Elvis Presley and Janice Joplin. A tribute album, If I Were a Carpenter, by contemporary artists such as Sonic Youth, Betty Serviert, Shonen Knife, Grant Lee Buffalo, Matthew Sweet and the Cranberries, appeared in 1994 and provided an alternative rock interpretation of Carpenters' hits. Several of their songs have achieved the status of popular standards. Superstar has been covered by numerous artists, with popular recordings from Luther Vandross and Ruben Stuttered to Bette Midler, Shonen Knife, Sonic Youth and Colleen Hewitt. Both we've only just begun and, they long to be, close to you have been honored with Grammy Hall of Fame awards for recordings of lasting quality or historical significance. Modern entertainers such as Christina Aguilera, Gwen Stefani, Shania Twain, Jan Arden, Anastasia, The Cores, Mary J. Bleach, Alicia Keys, Chrissy Hind, Gloria Estefan, Laurie Morgan, Leanne Rimes, Michelle Wright, Katie Lang, Kelly Jones of Stereophonics, Christina Perry, Beyoncé, Johnny Borrell of Razorlight, Joe Omira from S-Club, Carney Wilson from Wilson Phillips, Mandy Moore, Michael Jackson and Madonna have listed Karen Carpenter as a huge influence on their careers. Grammy Awards and Nominations Throughout the 1970s, Karen and Richard were nominated numerous times for Grammy Awards. Richard Carpenter was also nominated for a Grammy Award for their instrumental song, Flat Baroque. They won three Grammy Awards, and had two songs inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame.