There are so many undiscovered great artists in the world. To make it to the top you need to be in the right place at the right time, you need to be just as lucky as you are talented. Yes, it’s easier to make your music more available to the public now than it ever has but that’s no guarantee that people are going to hear it.
It’s not just in music that this happens but sports, acting, and even the medial job you are working right now. The planets have to align to help you get that special breakthrough. Sometimes it can take years for this to happen, even decades. This is where our story leads today. This week The Beat Marches On to the 10th August 1974, the day Connie Converse returns to New York.
Not many have heard of the name Connie Converse, and even fewer have heard her music but as a songwriter, she broke the mould. An influencer of influential artists such as Bob Dylan and the rest of the early New York folk scene she was taking on subject matters only dreamed of at the time. When chart music of the 1950s was crooning love songs or show tunes, the subject matter of Converse’s song was loneliness, promiscuity, day drinking and quarrelling lovers. Inspired by the myth of Cassandra, a woman who was given the gift of prophecy by the Roman Gods but cursed by Apollo no one would believe her.
The singer arrived in New York in the early 1950s as an act of rebellion. Dropping out of her four-year scholarship at college and much to the disappointment of her conservative parents she took up drinking and smoking. She was socially awkward but did find herself in a new burgeoning folk scene in the village district of the Big Apple.
Connie started playing songs as soon she found an apartment. Already knowing how to play the guitar, she taught herself the piano too. She didn’t ever play a big concert, just played in front of a few people at parties. Her friends said she wasn’t good at self-promotion and didn’t abide by female traditions, some described her as having quite a potent body odour and bad teeth which held her back.
In 1954 Converse got a big break as she made her only TV appearance on the CBS morning show performing one of her songs. Unfortunately, the performance didn’t go anywhere. Around this time her songs were being recorded, not in a studio but in the kitchen of her apartment. People will hear this just not as early as you think.
After spending most of the 1950’s in New York, by 1961 the singer decided to leave the city and go to Michigan with her family. It wasn’t long after Bob Dylan was discovered, it’s unsure whether this was the reason why or not but wouldn’t be surprising if true.
While in Michigan she was editor of the Journal for Conflict Resolution and became an advocate for people’s rights throughout the 1960s. it looked like she was adapting to normal life and a standard job, however, her family noticed how heavier her drinking was becoming while in Michigan.
In 1974, a week after her 50th birthday Converse decided that she was to travel back to New York as she felt she had unfinished business in the city. Family members had said she wasn’t quite herself over the last few years despite trips to Alaska and the UK. These days it would probably be classed as a mid-life crisis.
Unfortunately, Connie never made it to New York. Her body or the car has never been found. Of course, as soon as people found out she was missing the rumour mill went into overdrive. The general consensus is she drove her car into a body of water however, some have suspected that she faked her death and is living in a remote town somewhere in the US. As there’s no proof the rumour mill is going to keep churning out rumours.
The legacy of Connie Converse doesn’t end there. In 2004 David Garland, an American DJ, was passed one of her tapes recorded 50 years earlier and he played it on his show. The track proved popular with his audience and the singer had finally caught a break, unfortunately, she had been missing for 30 years.
Her popularity grew so much that in 2009 an album of the 1954 kitchen recordings was released. How Sad, How Lovely was a 19-track album which was praised by critics and the singer finally had a cult following. A second album in 2020 was released, Sad Lady, with some unearthed home recordings from 1956.
Converse is still being celebrated today as one week ago (3rd August) on what would have been her 100th birthday, Concord, New Hampshire, her hometown, celebrated the singer’s accomplishments. Many people are creating shows based on her work and covering her songs reaching them out to new audiences.
It is criminal that Connie Converse didn’t get any attention in the 1950s from record labels. As some have proclaimed she is one of the first modern songwriters and if it wasn’t for some good fortune then we may never have heard her music. It makes you wonder how many others over the years we have missed. There could be recordings hiding in an attic or basement just waiting to be heard.
The Beat Marches On is a music blog written by Jimmy Whitehead. Jimmy has been blogging for six years specialising in Sports (especially American Football). If you want to follow Jimmy on Twitter: @Jimmy_W1987
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The websites used for research were:
Connie Converse: ‘Great lost singer’ celebrated on 100th birthday – BBC News
Connie Converse, The Singer Who Vanished Without A Trace (allthatsinteresting.com)
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