Almanac of Story Tellers: Harry Chapin

Every day brings a new story.  And each day contributes to story telling -- in prose and in poetry, in art and in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books 

Today is the story of Dec. 7th

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    It is the 341st day of the year, leaving 24 days remaining in 2022.

 

    On this date in 1942, the folk singer Harry Chapin was born.

    He told his stories in song. They were folk stories, sometimes of real people and real events, set to music. Some were love stories; some were cautionary tales; some told stories of the down and out; many were about people with sad stories about their lives. 

    Perhaps his most famous story-song was also one of his biggest hits, Taxi, released in 1972. It told of a taxi driver picking up his last fare of the night, who turned out to be an old flame. Years ago, they went on their separate ways -- "She was going to be an actress/ I was going to learn to fly/ She took off to find the footlights/ I took off to find the sky."

    In the end, they sorta, kinda found their dreams. "And here, she's acting happy/ Inside her handsome home/ And me, I'm flying in my taxi, taking tips and getting stoned/ I go flying so high when I'm stoned."

    Chapin was at his best during the 1970s, putting out an album a year, touring regularly, getting some radio play, having a few hits. But in the era of sub-three-minute hits, his songs were too long for comfortable radio play -- Taxi clocked in close to 6 1/2 minutes. One, There Only Was One Choice, was nearly 15 minutes long, taking up the entire side of an LP released in 1977.

    He did have other hits, though. Cat's In the Cradle -- about a father who cannot find time for his son who learns his son cannot find time for him -- was a No. 1 single in 1974. W*O*L*D, about an aging radio disc jockey, was an international hit in 1973.

    He was also a playwright. The Night That Made America Famous was nominated for two Tony Awards in 1975. He wrote the music and lyrics for Cotton Patch Gospel, which sets the Gospels according to Matthew and John in 1970s rural Georgia. It ran off-Broadway for 193 performances in 1981.

    But he was more than story teller and old folkie -- he was a humanitarian who cofounded the organization World Hunger Year, and who spoke incessantly during his concerts about the need to end hunger. 

    Chapin died in 1981.