Probable reasons why Connie Converse, American singer of the 1950s failed to gain fame!
Connie Converse was a great and talented singer ahead of her times. But she could not make it to the top during her lifetime.
On 3 August 2024, it would be her 100th birth anniversary and on 10th August 2024, it would be 50 years since she disappeared from Ann Arbor, Michigan.
Musician Howard Fishman released her biography last year. This 3rd August, Howard is celebrating her 100th birthday in her hometown of Concord in New Hampshire. That would be the first official recognition of her work. He says:
“The unfortunate and darkly poetic thing is that she needed to disappear in order for us to see her,”
“That was the hook that was needed for us to pay attention to her.”
“But what I always say is, don’t focus on how she disappeared, focus on how she lived, because her life is so much more fascinating and meaningful, and has so much more to teach us than the fact that at age 50, she felt that she had to vanish.”
Connie left saying she is going to New York City to retry her career. But Howard feels that she never made it to New York or anywhere else. He added:
“I’d love to think that she started a new life somewhere else, and that she lived more years. But who knows?”
Probable reasons why Connie Converse could not get fame
Over the years, experts have provided several reasons as to why Connie, despite her talent, never made a big name for herself in American music industry. She was a great lost talent from Greenwich Village while others from the same place such as Bob Dylan quickly made a name for themselves. Connie’s songs were sophisticated, intimate and beautiful. But for some reason, she did not gain fame.
It was in 2009 when her work was first published commercially. She used to only sing to small gatherings. Connie managed to have an appearance on This Morning show on CBS with the help of Gene Deitch. Howard states:
“I love to think about an alternate reality in which Connie Converse’s music did receive the recognition it deserved in its own time, and she became a recognised for the musical genius that she was,”
“I almost think a better version of American cultural history could have happened, had that been the case.”
However, Cass Sunstein who authored the book How To Become Famous feels that Connie was not better than Bob Dylan. He also feels that Connie had obstacles due to her gender. Cass also believes that her songs had melody but the melancholy in them did not appeal to the masses at that time. Talking about the difference, Howard adds:
“She didn’t sound like anybody else that was making music in her own day,”
“And she doesn’t sound like anybody else making music now, to my ears.”
The folk historian, Ellen Stekert feels that Connie was wonderful but she was too isolated and in herself:
“I think she was wonderful. I think she was totally out of sequence of any kind of cultural impulse,”
“She was self-contained, and also self-isolated. It was too bad somebody could not break through that.”
Ellen feels that she did not get the right kind of support from a male person that would have helped her achieve heights. Also, she was socially awkward and failed to self-promote.
Talking about her physicality, Ellen added:
“Unfortunately, she didn’t have much social understanding of things. She did not have a very good rapport, I think, with people.”
“Evidently, she had very bad teeth and her body odour also was fairly prominent. And those are two factors in middle-class America that will make sure you don’t make it any place.”
Connie’s appreciation
American DJ David Garland had first played her songs in the year 2004. British singer Vashti Bunyan was impressed with the songs and said:
“I couldn’t believe that they were [recorded] so long ago, it was the 1950s,”
“And just to hear her speaking in a way that I would have always wanted to speak was very moving.”
“She was completely ahead of her time, and it must have been very hard for her. She must have felt isolated.”
“If she had any ambition for her songs, she must have known how good they were, how clever and funny and wonderful they were, and poetic. But other people didn’t seem to recognize that kind of genius writing at the time.”
Some of songs of Connie were home-recordings and were released after her death. Vashti adds:
“And how lucky that she was recorded,”
“Connie was recorded by her friends, and none of those recordings were supposed to be commercially released.”
“But it’s so wonderful that they have been, that they have been found. And it makes you wonder about all the other people that weren’t.”
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Posted on: Saturday, August 3 2024
