Mary Chapin Carpenter
Mary Chapin Carpenter
Mary Chapin Carpenteris an American singer, songwriter and musician. Carpenter spent several years singing in Washington, D.C. clubs before signing in the late 1980s with Columbia Records, who marketed her as a country singer. Carpenter's first album, 1987's Hometown Girl, did not produce any singles, although 1989's State of the Heart and 1990's Shooting Straight in the Dark each produced four Top 20 hits on the Billboard country singles charts...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionMusician
Date of Birth21 February 1958
CountryUnited States of America
In the late 80s, artists could be signed to labels and be nurtured. It wasn't, "We're going to give you one shot, and if you don't measure up, you're gone".
I was a liberal arts junkie and I figured, well, I'll go work for somebody somewhere. All I knew was that I was going to have to come home and figure it out.
I'm a liberal arts junkie.
When I think of the artists I admire and seek out musically. It's because I'm curious about where they're going to go the next time they have a chance to put a record out. It's not about where I find them on the radio dial, or how many records they're selling.
I know some artists who come out of country music and the three sessions a day work ethic where you walk in, and you're told you play this note, this note, and this note, and you don't vary it. I know that works great for some people. It wouldn't work for me.
It's like the code of living by yourself. People who are single know what I'm talking about. You eat standing up, reading the paper. Or you say to yourself, this isn't even cutting it, I'm taking a TV dinner and I'm getting in bed here.
It's a marvelous feeling when someone says 'I want to do this song of yours' because they've connected to it. That's what I'm after.
I went to college and I never allowed myself to think for an instant that I would have this chance to do this.
There's timing. And then there's also certain people at the record company who worked incredibly hard and were incredibly enthusiastic about what I was doing.
I grew up listening to everything, and when I got signed to a record deal out of Nashville, that was my introduction to what was happening in country music.
When I started out, it was this sense of, "Let's put out a record and see what happens and see where you go and see how you feel and where we can take it." That was a very different world back then.
I feel that it's nothing if not an incredible privilege to be able to get up on stage and play for people, and I don't ever take it for granted.
I think topical songwriting is a real gift, and it's hard not to be pedantic and show up with the sledgehammer message.
I feel like politics have always informed what I do. If you know anything about my music, you know I've never been shy about stating how I vote.