Carly Simon
Carly Elisabeth Simon
is a Jewish American
singer-songwriter, musician, and children's author. Carly Simon rose
to fame in the 1970s with a string of hit records, and has since
been the recipient of two Grammy Awards, an Academy Award, and a
Golden Globe Award for her work. Throughout her career, Carly Simon
has amassed 13 Top 40 hits including "You're So Vain", "Nobody Does
It Better", and "Coming Around Again".
The former wife of another notable singer-songwriter, James Taylor,
Carly Simon has two children, Sarah "Sally" Maria Taylor and Ben
Taylor, who are also musicians.
Carly Simon was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1994.
Early life
Carly Simon was born in New York City, New York on born June 25,
1945. Her father, of Jewish descent, was Richard
L. Simon (co-founder of Simon & Schuster), a pianist who often
played Chopin and Beethoven at home. Her mother was Andrea Louise
Simon (née Heinemann),[1] a civil rights activist and singer, of
black[2] and German descent. In a 2004 interview with fashion
designer Michael Kors for the July issue of Interview Magazine,
Carly Simon revealed her full ancestry as
Jewish, African, Cuban, and
French.[3]
Carly Simon was raised in the Riverdale neighborhood of the Bronx,
New York City[4] and has two older sisters, Joanna (b. 1940) and
Lucy (b. 1943), and a younger brother, Peter (b. 1947). They were
raised as nominal Catholics, according to a book of photography
Peter published in the late 1990s.[5] Carly Simon attended Riverdale
Country School. Carly Simon also briefly attended Sarah Lawrence
College and joined Alpha Gamma Delta, before dropping out to pursue
music.
Career
Early career
Carly Carly Simon's career began with a short-lived music group with
her sister Lucy as The Carly Simon Sisters. They had a minor hit in
1964 called "Winkin', Blinkin', and Nod", and made three albums
together before Lucy left to get married and start a family. Later,
Carly collaborated with eclectic New York rockers Elephant's Memory
for about six months. Carly Simon also appeared in the 1971 Milos
Forman movie Taking Off, playing an auditioning singer, and sang
"Long Term Physical Effects", which was included in Taking Off, the
1971 soundtrack for the movie.
Going solo
Her solo music career began in 1971, with the self-titled Carly
Simon on Elektra Records. The album contained her breakthrough
top-ten hit "That's the Way I've Always Heard It Should Be". It was
followed quickly by a second album, Anticipation. The title song
from that album, written about a romance between Carly Simon and
Yusuf Islam (known then as Cat Stevens), was a significant hit,
reaching #3 at Easy Listening radio and #13 on Billboard's Hot 100.
The next single release - also reportedly written about Stevens,
though perhaps about James Taylor, whom Carly Simon had known since
childhood - was "Legend In Your Own Time" which made a more modest
impact on the charts, peaking at #50 on the Hot 100.[6] After their
brief liaison during 1970–1971 ended amicably, Stevens wrote his
song "Sweet Scarlet" about Carly Simon, who also had highly
publicized relationships with Warren Beatty, Mick Jagger, Kris
Kristofferson and James Taylor during this period.
Success
In 1973 Carly Simon scored the biggest success of her career with
the classic global smash "You're So Vain". It hit #1 on the U.S. Pop
and Adult Contemporary charts, and sold over a million copies in the
United States alone. It was one of the decade's biggest hits and
propelled Carly Simon's breakthrough album No Secrets to #1 on the
U.S. album charts, where it stayed for six consecutive weeks. The
album achieved Gold status that year, but by the album's 25th
anniversary in 1997, the album had been certified Platinum. "You're
So Vain" received Grammy Award nominations for Record Of The Year,
Song Of The Year and Best Pop Vocal Performance, Female.
Additionally, in 2008, it was listed at #72 on the Billboard Hot
100's list of the top 100 songs from the chart's first 50 years,
August 1958 through July 2008.
The subject of the song itself has become one of the biggest enigmas
in popular music, as this track also carries one of the most famous
lyrics: "You're so vain/I bet you think this song is about you."
Carly Simon has never publicly admitted who the song is about. Carly
Simon hinted that it could be a composite of several people, and for
many people the most likely "suspects" have always been Beatty or
Jagger, who sings backup vocals on this recording. Carly Simon has
given vague hints over the decades to a variety of talk shows and
publications, saying that riddles wouldn't be interesting if
everyone knew the answers to them. On August 5, 2003, Carly Simon
did finally auction off the information to the winner of a charity
function for a grand total of US$50,000, with the condition that the
winner (a television executive, Dick Ebersol on NBC's Today Show)
not reveal who it is.[7]
Later in 1973, the follow-up single, "The Right Thing To Do", was
another sizable hit, reaching #4 Adult Contemporary and #17 Pop.
That same year Carly Simon performed on Lee Clayton's album Lee
Clayton and co-sang on the song "New York Suite 409" and on
Livingston Taylor's album Over the Rainbow and sang with both
Livingston and his famous brother, James Taylor (who was, by then,
her husband) on the songs "Loving Be My New Horizon" and "Pretty
Woman".
In 1974, Carly Simon followed the smash No Secrets album with
Hotcakes, which reached #3 on Billboard's Album Chart and was
certified Gold, though it did not match the sales of No Secrets.
Hotcakes included two top ten singles, "Mockingbird", a duet with
James Taylor that peaked at #5 on Billboard's Pop Singles chart, and
"Haven't Got Time For the Pain", which hit #2 on Billboard's Adult
Contemporary chart.[8] The same year, Carly Simon provided vocals on
Tom Rush's album Ladies Love Outlaws and co-sang with Rush on "No
Regrets" and as backup on "Claim On Me". In 1975, Elektra released
her first greatest-hits album, The Best of Carly Simon, which became
Carly Simon's all time best selling disc and eventually reached
Triple-Platinum status in the United States.
Carly Simon's record sales declined considerably with 1975's Playing
Possum and 1976's Another Passenger. Playing Possum was a Top Ten
album, with a Top 40 single "Attitude Dancing" and two other
charting singles,[9] but Another Passenger produced only one single,
"It Keeps You Running", with the Doobie Brothers, as which barely
scraped into the top 50.[10] 1976 also saw Carly Simon contributing
backup vocals on the song "Peter" on Peter Ivers's album Peter Ivers.
Carly Simon also made her only appearance on Saturday Night Live. It
was a pre-taped performance—a rare occurrence on that show—because
Carly Simon suffered terrible bouts of stage fright. In the
appearance, Carly Simon sang two songs: "Half A Chance" and her
signature song, "You're So Vain".
In 1977, Carly Simon had a surprise international hit with "Nobody
Does It Better", the theme to the James Bond film The Spy Who Loved
Me. The million-selling Gold single held at #2 for several weeks,
behind Debby Boone's mega-hit "You Light Up My Life" (which became
the biggest hit of the entire decade). "Nobody Does It Better"
remains Carly Simon's second-biggest U.S. hit, after "You're So
Vain". It was 1977's biggest Adult Contemporary hit, where it held
at #1 for seven straight weeks. It also received Grammy nominations
for Song Of The Year and Best Pop Vocal Performance Female.
Also in 1977, Carly Simon co-produced Libby Titus's album Libby
Titus and sang backup on two songs: "Can This Be Our Love Affair?"
and "Darkness 'Til Dawn".
Carly Simon's career took another upward swing in 1978 with the hit
album Boys In The Trees. The album produced another Top 10 Pop and
Adult Contemporary hit with the jazzy and sensual "You Belong To
Me". Boys In The Trees was a major success, and returned Carly Simon
to Platinum album status in the U.S. It later earned Carly Simon yet
another Grammy nomination. Carly Simon was featured on the front
covers of People and Rolling Stone magazines that spring. Also in
1978, Carly Simon and James Taylor sang backing vocals on two songs
for Taylor's sister Kate's album Kate Taylor: "Happy Birthday Sweet
Darling" and "Jason & Ida". Carly Simon and Taylor also sang backup
on three songs on John Hall's debut solo album John Hall, "The
Fault", "Good Enough" and "Voyagers". Carly Simon and Taylor would
also sing backup on one song, "Power", from Hall's next album, which
is also titled Power (1979).
On November 2, 1978, Carly Simon guested on the song "I Live In The
Woods" at a live, four-hour concert by Burt Bacharach and the
Houston Symphony Orchestra at Jones Hall in Houston, Texas. All the
songs at that concert became Bacharach's album Woman, which was
released in 1979. That year, shortly after the Three Mile Island
nuclear accident, from September 19 to September 22, a series of
concerts were held at New York City's Madison Square Garden and
sponsored by Musicians United for Safe Energy (MUSE), a group of
musicians against nuclear power, co-founded by John Hall. Always
politically active, Carly Simon and James Taylor were part of the
concerts which later became a documentary and concert film, No Nukes
(1980) as well as a live album of the same name (1979).
Carly Simon released her last album for Elektra, Spy, in 1979. It
sold poorly, although a harder-edged single from the album,
"Vengeance", was a modest hit and received airplay on U.S. album
rock stations. "Vengeance" earned Carly Simon a Grammy nomination
for Best Rock Vocal Performance Female in early 1980 - the first
year to feature the new category.
From 1972 to 1979, Carly Simon sang backup vocals on the following
James Taylor songs and albums (not counting compilations): "One Man
Parade" from 1972's One Man Dog, "Rock 'n' Roll Is Music Now", "Let
It All Fall Down", "Me And My Guitar", "Daddy's Baby" and "Ain't No
Song" from 1974's Walking Man, "How Sweet It Is (To Be Loved By
You)" from 1975's Gorilla, "Shower the People", "A Junkie's Lament",
"Slow Burning Love" and "Family Man[disambiguation needed]" from
1976's In the Pocket, and "B.S.U.R." from 1979's Flag. Carly Simon
also co-wrote with Taylor the song "Terra Nova" on his 1977 album
JT.
1980s
In 1980, Carly Simon signed with Elektra's sibling label Warner
Bros. Records. During a show in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, while
Carly Simon toured to promote her album, Come Upstairs, Carly Simon
collapsed onstage of exhaustion. Carly Simon subsequently performed
considerably less throughout the 1980s. Carly Simon scored another
million-selling U.S. Gold single with the hit, "Jesse", from that
album. Carly Simon also contributed the song "Be With Me" to the
1980 album In Harmony: A Sesame Street Record, which was produced by
her sister Lucy and Lucy's husband, David Levine. Carly Simon can
also be heard on the song "In Harmony", along with other members of
the Carly Simon/Taylor families. Carly and Lucy contributed a "Carly
Simon Sisters" song — which was called "Maryanne" — to the 1982
follow-up album In Harmony 2, which was also produced by Lucy and
her husband. Both albums won Grammy Awards for Best Album for
Children.
Torch (1981) was an album of melancholy jazz standards, but suffered
from disappointing sales. The Nile Rodgers & Bernard Edwards
produced single "Why", from the soundtrack to the 1982 film Soup For
One, was a top-ten hit single in the U.K. but stalled at #74 in the
U.S. Carly Simon had another minor U.K. success with the single
"Kissing With Confidence", a song off the 1983 album Dancing For
Mental Health by Will Powers (a pseudonym for photographer Lynn
Goldsmith). Carly Simon was the uncredited singer of the song
co-written and mixed by Todd Rundgren. Carly Simon's singles were
generally less successful in the 1980s, although most of them did
quite well on Adult Contemporary radio formats. In 1983, Carly Simon
made her last album for Warner, Hello Big Man, but this also
suffered from disappointing sales. That same year, Carly Simon
performed on two albums, The Perfect Stranger by Jesse Colin Young
(singing on the track "Fight For It" with Young) and Wonderland by
Nils Lofgren (singing on the track "Lonesome Ranger" with Lofgren).
By this time, her contract with Warner Bros. had ended. In 1985,
Carly Simon signed with Epic Records and made one album for them,
Spoiled Girl. This too was commercially unsuccessful and her
contract with Epic was cancelled.
In 1986, Carly Simon signed with Arista Records and soon rebounded
from her career slump. Her first album for Arista, Coming Around
Again (1987), gave Carly Simon another international hit with the
title track (which was featured in the film Heartburn), returning
her to the Billboard Pop Top 20 and the U.K. Top 10 (It also
garnered her a Grammy nomination for Best Female Pop Vocal
Performance). The album also featured the Top 10 Adult Contemporary
hits "Give Me All Night", "The Stuff That Dreams Are Made Of", "All
I Want Is You" and a cover of "As Time Goes By" (featuring Stevie
Wonder on harmonica). The album itself was her first Gold release in
nine years, and went Platinum in 1988. These and older songs were
featured in a picturesque HBO concert special which was filmed at
Martha's Vineyard, where Carly Simon and her band performed live on
a pier. Most of these songs were compiled for her 1988 album,
Greatest Hits Live. The album continued her mounting comeback,
quickly going Gold, and was later certified Platinum by the RIAA in
1996. From Live a recording of Carly Simon's evergreen "You're So
Vain" was released as a single in the UK.
Throughout the 1980s, Carly Simon successfully contributed to
several film and television scores, including the songs:
"Why" for the film Soup For One (1982)
"Something More" for the film Love Child (1982)
"Someone Waits for You" for the film Swing Shift (1984)
"All the Love in the World" for the film Torchlight (1985)
"It's Hard To Be Tender" for the television miniseries Sins (1986)
"If It Wasn't Love" for the film Nothing In Common (1986)
"Two Looking at One" for the film The Karate Kid, Part II (1986)
"Coming Around Again"/"Itsy Bitsy Spider" for the film Heartburn
(1986)
"Let the River Run" for the film Working Girl (1988) (for which
Carly Simon won the Academy Award for Best Song (1988); the Golden
Globe Award for Best Song (1988); and the Grammy Award for Best Song
Written for a Motion Picture, Television or Other Visual Media
(1990))
Carly Simon is the first artist to win all three awards (Oscar,
Golden Globe and Grammy) for a song that is composed and written, as
well as performed, entirely by a single artist (the only other such
artist being Bruce Springsteen for his "Streets of Philadelphia"
1993: Oscar, 1994: Golden Globe & two Grammys).
The Working Girl soundtrack album came out in early 1989, and
featured more music from Carly Simon, and as a tribute to Christa
McAuliffe, who was slated to be the first teacher in space and who
died in the 1986 Space Shuttle Challenger disaster for whom Carly
Simon also wrote a song "You're Where I Go". McAuliffe was a Carly
Simon fan and had taken a cassette of her music on board the
shuttle.
In 1987, Carly Simon also sang the theme for the 1988 Democratic
National Convention, "The Turn of The Tide", for a Marlo Thomas
television special Free to Be...A Family. The song was later
included on the 1988 soundtrack album of the same name on A&M
Records.
1990s
In 1990, Carly Simon released two albums: her second standards
album, My Romance, and an album of original material Have You Seen
Me Lately. The latter featured a major (#4) Adult Contemporary chart
hit with "Better Not Tell Her" - Carly Simon's biggest hit of the
1990s. Her second children's book, "The Boy of the Bells" was also
published in 1990 and Carly Simon wrote the score for the 1990 film
Postcards from the Edge. In 1991, Carly Simon wrote her third
children's book, "The Fisherman's Song", which was based on the song
of the same name from her 1990 album Have You Seen Me Lately. The
same year, Carly Simon performed a duet with Plácido Domingo on the
song "The Last Night Of The World" (from the Miss Saigon musical) on
Domingo's album The Broadway I Love. A year later, Carly Simon wrote
the music for the Nora Ephron film This Is My Life, which included
the song "Love Of My Life". In 1993, Carly Simon contributed the
song "In the Wee Small Hours of the Morning" for the film Sleepless
In Seattle and recorded the same song in combo with "Guess I'll Hang
My Tears Out to Dry" with Frank Sinatra for his album Duets.
1993 also saw Carly Simon recording a contemporary opera called
Romulus Hunt (having been commissioned by the Metropolitan Opera
Association and the Kennedy Center). Carly Simon also published her
fourth children's book, The Nighttime Chauffeur. Carly Simon also
contributed to Andreas Vollenweider's album Eolian Minstrel. Carly
Simon co-wrote the song "Private Fires" with Vollenweider and was
featured vocalist on the song.
In 1994, Carly Simon covered the song "Take Me Out To The Ball Game"
for Ken Burns' film Baseball, as well as a recording of "I've Got a
Crush On You" for Larry Adler's covers album The Glory of Gershwin.
That same year, Carly Simon recorded another album of original
songs, Letters Never Sent, and contributed a Christmas song, "The
Night Before Christmas", to the soundtrack for the film Mixed Nuts.
In April 1995, Carly Simon surprised thousands of commuters at New
York's Grand Central Terminal with an unannounced performance which
was filmed for a Lifetime Television Special. It was also released
on home video in December of that year. Also in 1995, Carly Simon
put aside years of stage fright long enough to perform on an
American concert tour in conjunction with Hall & Oates. On August
30, 1995, Carly Simon also made a rare joint appearance with her
ex-husband, James Taylor, for a concert on Martha's Vineyard. Dubbed
"Livestock '95", it was a benefit for the Martha's Vineyard
Agricultural Society, with over 10,000 people in attendance. Carly
Simon performed a duet with Mindy Jostyn on the song "Time, Be On My
Side", featured on Jostyn's 1995 album Five Miles From Hope about
her recent battle with colon cancer. Ten years later, Jostyn would
pass away from the disease at the age of 43. 1995 also saw the
release of Clouds In My Coffee, a boxed set of highlights from her
30 year career from 1965 to 1995.
Carly Simon continued to write and record music for films and wrote
the theme songs to several more movies including "Two Little
Sisters" from the 1996 movie Marvin's Room and "In Two Straight
Lines" from the 1998 movie Madeline. 1997 saw the release of Carly
Simon's third standards album, Film Noir, which was recorded in
collaboration with Jimmy Webb and for which Carly Simon was
nominated for the Grammy Award for Best Traditional Vocal
Performance. Carly Simon also released her fifth children's book,
"Midnight Farm". Carly Simon was diagnosed with breast cancer in
1997, and underwent surgery that year and again in 1998. In 1999 The
Very Best Of Carly Simon: Nobody Does It Better, a UK-only greatest
hits album, was released. Also that year, Carly Simon worked again
with the Swiss musician Andreas Vollenweider, and was the featured
vocalist for the song "Your Silver Key" on Vollenweider's album
Cosmopoly.
During the 1990s, the American press reported an incident between
Carly Simon and the Pretenders' vocalist Chrissie Hynde, at a Joni
Mitchell concert at New York's Fez Club. Some reports stated that a
drunk and disorderly Hynde grabbed Carly Simon around the neck and
punched her, although Carly Simon attempted to put these rumors to
rest on her official website in 2002. Numerous witnesses, however,
claim that Carly Simon was, indeed, assaulted by Hynde.[11]
2000s
In 2000, Carly Simon released a new album, The Bedroom Tapes.
Largely written and recorded at home in her bedroom (hence the
title) while Carly Simon was recuperating from her health problems
of the previous couple of years, it was her first album of original
songs in almost six years. Despite this, the album did not sell
well, though one of the album's tracks, "Our Affair", was remixed
and featured in the Gwyneth Paltrow/Ben Affleck film "Bounce". In
2001, Carly Simon performed on "Son of a Gun (I Betcha Think This
Song Is About You)" with Janet Jackson on Jackson's album All for
You. Carly Simon also contributed back-up vocals on two songs,
"Don't Turn Away" and "East Of Eden", for Mindy Jostyn's 2001 album
Blue Stories. In November 2001, Carly Simon's Oscar-winning song
"Let the River Run" was used in a public service ad for the United
States Postal Service. Entitled "Pride", it was produced to boost
public confidence and postal worker morale in the wake of the
September 11, 2001 attacks and the 2001 Anthrax attacks.
In 2002, Carly Simon recorded a Christmas album, Christmas Is Almost
Here, for Rhino Records, while Carly Simon was in Los Angeles to
lend support to her son Ben Taylor and his band. That same year,
Carly Simon personally chose all of the songs for a new two-disc
anthology album, simply titled Anthology, for Rhino Records. 2003
saw a re-release of her 2002 Christmas album with two extra tracks
and now called Christmas Is Almost Here Again on Rhino Records. The
two extra tracks, "White Christmas" and "Forgive", were also
released as a single. Carly Simon also performed several concerts
during the 2004 holiday season at Harlem's Apollo Theater, along
with BeBe Winans, son Ben and daughter Sally, Rob Thomas, Livingston
Taylor, Mindy Jostyn and Kate Taylor, along with other members of
the Taylor and Carly Simon family.
Among Carly Simon's recent work, there were songs for the Disney
Winnie the Pooh films Piglet's Big Movie in 2003 and Pooh's
Heffalump Movie in 2005. Several of her songs were also featured in
the 2004 movie Little Black Book that starred Brittany Murphy and
Holly Hunter. Carly Simon appears in a cameo role as herself at the
end of the movie. 2004 also saw the release of her fourth greatest
hits album, Reflections: Carly Carly Simon's Greatest Hits, which
peaked at #22 on the Billboard charts that year (#25 in the UK). The
album became Carly Simon's first Gold-certified disc since the late
1980s.
In 2005, Carly Simon released her fourth album of standards, titled
Moonlight Serenade. A surprise hit, it reached #7 on the Billboard
Album charts, her highest-charting album in nearly 30 years. Carly
Simon was also nominated for Best Traditional Pop Vocal Album. To
promote Moonlight Serenade, Carly Simon performed two concerts
onboard the Queen Mary 2 which were recorded and released on DVD in
2005. Carly Simon also performed a concert tour in the United States
- her first tour in 10 years. Carly Simon also sang a duet, "Angel
Of The Darkest Night", with Mindy Jostyn on Jostyn's 2005 album
Coming Home. The album was released several months after Jostyn's
death on March 10, 2005. As one of Carly Simon's closest friends,
Jostyn was married to Jacob Brackman, Carly Simon's long-time friend
and musical collaborator. In 2005, Carly Simon became involved in
the legal defense of musician and family friend John Forté with his
struggle against a federal incarceration.
Carly Simon again teamed up with the Swiss musician Andreas
Vollenweider for his 2006 holiday album, Midnight Clear. Carly Simon
performed vocals on the tracks "Midnight Clear", "Suspended Note",
"Hymn to the Secret Heart" and "Forgive" (which was a song Carly
Simon wrote for her own 2002 holiday album Christmas Is Almost
Here). Also in 2006, Carly Simon performed with Livingston Taylor on
his album There You Are Again, singing on the opening track "We're
The Best Of Friends".
In 2007, Carly Simon released her fifth album of covers, a
collection of "soothing songs and lullabies" called Into White for
Columbia Records. The collection featured covers of songs by Cat
Stevens, the title track, recordings by Judy Garland, The Beatles
and the Everly Brothers, as well as two new original songs. It also
featured vocal collaborations with her children, Ben Taylor and
Sally Taylor. The album continued Carly Simon's recently rejuvenated
high chart profile and became Billboard′s Hot Shot Debut, entering
the chart at number #13.
In March 2008, it was announced that Carly Simon had signed to the
Starbucks label, Hear Music. Carly Simon released a new album
entitled This Kind of Love with them in the spring of 2008. The
album was her first collection of original songs since 2000's The
Bedroom Tapes.[12] However, in October 2009, it was reported that
Carly Simon was suing Starbucks, saying they did not adequately
promote the album — despite that it made the US Top 20 (#15) and
sold nearly 150,000 copies. Carly Simon's lawsuit stated that
Starbucks publicly announced it was backing out of participation in
Hear Music just days before the album came out — a decision that
Carly Simon claimed doomed the record before it was even
released.[13]
On June 19, 2008, Carly Simon and her son Ben performed "You're So
Vain" together on The Howard Stern Show on Sirius Satellite radio.
In October 2009, Carly Simon released Never Been Gone, an album of
acoustic reworkings of some of her classic songs.[14] The album was
released via Iris Records. On November 26, 2009, Carly Simon
appeared on the Care Bears float of the 83rd Annual Macy's
Thanksgiving Day Parade, where Carly Simon sang "Let The River
Run".[15]
On 2 March 2010, Radio 2 - An Evening With Carly Simon was
broadcast. Carly Simon performed live for the first time in the UK
to a small audience of approximately 100 people with her son Ben.
This coincided with the UK release of the Never Been Gone album,
which was released for the Mother's Day season and peaked at #45 (Carly
Simon's first studio album to reach the UK Top 100 since 1987's
Coming Around Again). Carly Simon also appeared on various UK
television shows to promote the album, including The One Show and
BBC Breakfast.
Film and television appearances
Besides music, Carly Simon has also appeared (as herself) in films,
such as the 1985 film Perfect, and an uncredited appearance in the
2004 film Little Black Book. On television, Carly Simon appeared
(also as herself) in a 1989 episode of Thirtysomething and was a
guest-caller on a 1995 episode of Frasier entitled "Roz in the
Doghouse".
Personal life
Carly Simon married fellow singer-songwriter James Taylor on
November 3, 1972.[16] Carly Simon and Taylor had two children, Sarah
"Sally" Maria Taylor (born January 7, 1974) and Benjamin "Ben" Carly
Simon Taylor (born January 22, 1977), both of whom are musicians and
political activists. Carly Simon and Taylor divorced in 1983.[17] In
the June 20, 2004, issue of Askmen.com, Carly Simon said that Carly
Simon no longer speaks to her ex-husband, James Taylor. "I would say
our relationship is non-existent. It's not the way I want it."[18]
On October 4, 2007, Carly Simon became a grandmother, when her
daughter Sally gave birth to a son, Bodhi Taylor Bragonier.[19]
Prior to her marriage to Taylor, Carly Simon was briefly engaged to
William Donaldson in the 1960s (who jilted fiancée Sarah Miles for
her).[20] Donaldson described her as "the answer to any sane man's
prayers; funny, quick, erotic, extravagantly talented."[21] Carly
Simon also was engaged to musician Russ Kunkel, from 1985 to
1986.[22]
Carly Simon married James Hart, a writer, poet, and businessman, on
December 23, 1987. The couple divorced in 2007.[citation needed]
Carly Simon underwent a mastectomy, chemotherapy, and reconstructive
surgery for breast cancer during 1997 and 1998. There had been a
lump in her breast for several years before then, but her doctors
had advised her against surgery. Carly Simon later recounted: "Then
one doctor said, 'You know what, I'd rather see it in a jar than in
your breast.'" Carly Simon also said that Carly Simon felt "a little
angry with myself" over the fact that Carly Simon did not insist on
taking it out sooner.[23] Carly Simon's surgery came at the same
time as the death of her long-time friend Linda McCartney, who had
also struggled with breast cancer. Carly Simon described McCartney's
death as having emotionally "crushed" her.[24]
Carly Simon resides on Martha's Vineyard and is associated with a
store in Vineyard Haven named Midnight Farm, the title of one of her
series of children's books from the late 1980s and 1990s.[citation
needed]
In an interview published on May 1, 2008, with the Bay Area
Reporter, an LGBT news service, Carly Simon was asked about the
possibility of a performance in the True Colors Tour. Carly Simon
responded, "The part that I could be involved in is the gay and
lesbian part. The part that would be hard for me is to commit to a
tour, because I'm not very comfortable being onstage. But the part
that would be easiest for me would be singing on behalf of all of
us. I don't consider myself to be not gay... I've enlarged all of my
possibilities. I have a lot of extremely personal stories to tell
about that, but we won't go into that right now. Let's just say that
it just depends upon who I'm with."[25]
Carly Simon has been close friends with James Taylor's younger
brother Livingston Taylor for over forty years. Livingston has said,
"I love Carly and Carly loves me. She's a ferocious advocate and
supporter of my music." They have worked as a musical duo for some
songs such as "Best of Friends", released in Livingston's 2006 album
There You Are Again, and others earlier in their careers.[26]
In May 2010 Carly Simon revealed Carly Simon had been one of the
several celebrities who fell victims to financial advisor Kenneth I.
Starr, now a prison inmate, whose Ponzi scheme lured her into
'investing' millions of dollars with him, which Carly Simon
lost.[27][28]
In an interview with Reuters on April 18, 2012, Carly Simon revealed
that Carly Simon has a severe stammer.[29]
Awards and recognition
Grammy Awards:
1971 – Best New Artist
1989 – Best Song Written Specifically for a Motion Picture or
Television for "Let the River Run" from Working Girl (1988)
2004 (inducted) – Grammy Hall of Fame Award for "You're So Vain"
(1972)
Academy Award:
1988 – Best Song, "Let the River Run" from Working Girl
Golden Globe Awards:
1989 – Best Original Song, "Let the River Run" from Working Girl
(1988)
Other awards:
1994 – inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame
2012 – awarded the ASCAP Founders Award
Discography
Main article: Carly Simon discography
Studio albums
Carly Simon, 1971
Anticipation, 1971
No Secrets, 1972
Hotcakes, 1974
Playing Possum, 1975
Another Passenger, 1976
Boys in the Trees, 1978
Spy, 1979
Come Upstairs, 1980
Torch, 1981
Hello Big Man, 1983
Spoiled Girl, 1985
Coming Around Again, 1987
My Romance, 1990
Have You Seen Me Lately, 1990
This Is My Life, 1992 (out of print)
Romulus Hunt: A Family Opera, 1993 (out of print)
Letters Never Sent, 1994
Film Noir, 1997
The Bedroom Tapes, 2000 (out of print)
Moonlight Serenade, 2005
Into White, 2007
This Kind of Love, 2008
Never Been Gone, 2009
Compilations
The Best of Carly Simon, 1975 – U.S. #17 (singles compilation)
Greatest Hits Live, 1988 – U.S. #87; U.K. #49 (singles compilation)
Clouds in My Coffee, 1995 (three-disc retrospective box set)
The Very Best Of Carly Simon: Nobody Does It Better, 1999 (singles
compilation) (out of print)
Christmas Is Almost Here, 2002 (Christmas compilation)
Anthology, 2002 (singles compilation) (out of print)
Christmas Is Almost Here Again, 2003 (Christmas compilation) (out of
print)
Reflections: Carly Carly Simon's Greatest Hits, 2004 (singles
compilation)
Carly Simon Collector's Edition, 2009 (tin box)
Videography
Live from Martha's Vineyard, 1987
Carly in Concert – My Romance, 1990
Live at Grand Central, 1995
A Moonlight Serenade on the Queen Mary 2, 2005
Christa McAuliffe: Reach for the Stars documentary, songs by Carly
Simon 2006 [1]
Books
Amy the Dancing Bear, 1989
The Boy of the Bells, 1990
The Fisherman's Song, 1991
The Nighttime Chauffeur, 1993
Midnight Farm, 1997
References
-
^
Staff writer (February 16, 1994).
"Andrea Heinemann Simon; Community Leader, 84".
The New York Times.
Retrieved November 13, 2010.
-
^
"Interview with Carly Simon". The Bill Miller Show.
January 2007. Retrieved 4
September 2011.
-
^
Kors, Michael (July 2004).
"Carly Simon: romance, pain, anticipation—if it's a human
impulse, then Carly Simon has sung about it.".
Interview.[dead
link]
Kors,
Michael (July 2004).
"Carly in INTERVIEW 2004". Interview (Carly Simon
Online). Retrieved 4
September 2011.
-
^
"Heroines in the Footlights, From All Sides Now".
The New York Times. April 17, 2008. Accessed May 3,
2008.
(registration
required)
-
^
Weller, Sheila (April 2009). Girls Like
Us:
Carole King,
Joni Mitchell, Carly Simon — and the Journey of a
Generation.
Washington Square Press. pp. 80–81.
ISBN 978-0-7434-9148-8.
-
^
"Lyrics from the songs which were written for Cat Stevens by
Carly Simon- with photo". Majicat.com.
Retrieved March 21, 2010.
-
^
Simon, Carly; Billboard Magazine (July 2008).
"Billboard Magazine's Hot 100 All-Time Top Songs".
Carly Simon Official Website.
Billboard.
Retrieved February 9, 2009.
-
^
"Billboard Singles Chart, Carly Simon".
Allmusic.
Retrieved March 30, 2010.
-
^
"Playing Possum Overview".
Allmusic.
Retrieved March 30, 2010.
-
^
"Carly Simon Billboard Singles".
Allmusic.
Retrieved March 30, 2010.
-
^
Simon, Carly (April 9, 2002).
"Ask Carly". Carly Simon official website. Archived from
the original on June 12, 2004.
Retrieved December 21, 2006.
-
^
Kreps, Daniel.
"Carly Simon Signs with Starbucks' Hear Music".
Rolling Stone.
Retrieved March 21, 2010.[dead
link]
-
^
Simon, Carly (September 14, 2009).
"Carly Simon Sues Starbucks over Album Deal".
Billboard.
Retrieved March 21, 2010.
-
^
"Carly Simon News - Yahoo! Music". Yahoo.com.
Retrieved March 23, 2010.
-
^
"Macy's Day Parade 2009". TV Guide. 2009-11-26.
Retrieved 2011-09-13.
-
^
White, Timothy (June 2002). James Taylor:
Long Ago and Far Away.
Omnibus Press.
ISBN 0-7119-9193-6.
-
^
Halperin, Ian (January 1, 2003). Fire and
Rain: The James Taylor Story (revised updated edition
ed.).
Citadel Press. p. 140.
ISBN 0-8065-2348-4.
-
^
by AskMen.com Editors (June 28, 2004).
"Celebrity News — Carly Simon". AskMen.com.
Retrieved March 21, 2010.
-
^
Taylor, Sally (October 4, 2007).
"Baby Bodhi Taylor Bragonier Is Born". Official Website.
Retrieved November 21, 2009.
-
^
Staff writer (June 25, 2005).
"William Donaldson — Womanising Satirist and Novelist Who
Squandered Several Fortunes on Wild Living".
The Times. Accessed November 13, 2010.
-
^
Hawtree, Christopher (June 25, 2005).
"Donaldson's Praise of Simon".
The Guardian.
Retrieved March 21, 2010.
-
^
"Carly Simon at". Hollywood.com.
Retrieved March 21, 2010.
-
^
"Carly Simon: Boho Queen". London:
The Independent. October 9, 2005.
-
^
Staff writer (May 5, 1998).
"Carly Simon Fighting Breast Cancer".
CNN.
Retrieved November 13, 2010.
-
^
Shapiro, Gregg (2011-09-08).
"The Bay Area Reporter Online | (Carly) Simon says".
Ebar.com. Retrieved
2011-09-13.
-
^
"Going Live with Liv | Music". Christianity Today.
2006-02-13. Retrieved
2011-09-13.
-
^
Veneziani, Vince
(June 11, 2010).
"Carly Simon Says She's Lost Millions of Dollars to Kenneth
Starr and Might Have To Live in a Trailer".
Business Insider. Accessed November 13, 2010.
-
^
Abelson, Max
(June 10, 2010).
"More on Carly Simon's Ken Starr Problems: Money, Dads, and
Gatsby".
The New York Observer. Accessed November 13, 2010.
-
^
Sue Zeidler (April 18, 2012).
"On stammering, stage fright and the love of music".
Ottawa Citizen.
Retrieved April 19, 2012.
External links
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