Eva Cassidy was the third of four children born to Hugh and Barbara Cassidy. From an early age, she displayed artistic and musical talent. When she was nine years old, her father taught her to play the guitar, and she began to play and sing at family gatherings.
While a student at Bowie High School, she did sing with a local band, called Stonehenge, and received considerable praise.
At the age of eighteen, Cassidy began her professional career, singing and playing guitar in a Washington, D.C., area band, called Easy Street. This band performed in a variety of styles, at weddings, corporate parties, and pubs.
During the summer of 1983, Cassidy sang and played guitar, six days per week, at Wild World, in Maryland. Her brother Dan was also a member of this working band.
Throughout the 1980s, Cassidy worked with a number of other bands, including the soul and Motown-oriented band The Honeybees, and the techno-pop band Characters Without Names, later called Method Actor.
During this period, Cassidy also worked as a propagator at a plant nursery and as a furniture painter in Annapolis, Maryland. In 1986, she met (bassist and recording engineer) Chris Biondo, who encouraged her and helped her find work as a backup singer for various acts. In 1990, Biondo and Cassidy hired the so-called "Eva Cassidy Band", composed of Chris Biondo, Lenny Williams, Keith Grimes and Raice McLeod, and she began to perform frequently in the Washington area.
In 1992, Biondo played a tape of Cassidy's voice for Chuck Brown. Best known as the "Godfather of Go-go", Brown is also a jazz and blues vocalist. This led to the first commercial recording of Cassidy, the duet album with Chuck Brown, The Other Side; which featured performances of classic songs such as "Fever", Billie Holiday's "God Bless the Child" and Cassidy's signature tune "Over the Rainbow". The album was released and distributed by Liaison Records, the label that also released Brown's Go-go albums. The duet CD attracted the attention of various record companies, but the offers all required Cassidy to pigeonhole herself within a single style (e.g., pop or jazz), something she adamantly refused to do.[citation needed]
In 1993 Eva Cassidy was first honored by the Washington area music community when she was awarded two Wammie awards for "Female Vocalist Roots/Traditional R&B" and "Vocalist Jazz/Traditional." The next year she was chosen to perform for the awards ceremony.
In January 1996, Cassidy recorded the album Live at Blues Alley, about which The Washington Post later commented that "she could sing anything and make it sound like the only music that mattered". [1] Cassidy was unhappy with her singing on the album, because she had a bad cold on the night of the recording; she began recording a studio album which was eventually released as Eva by Heart posthumously in 1997.
During a promotional event for the Live at Blues Alley CD in July 1996, Cassidy noticed an ache in her hips, which she attributed to stiffness from painting murals. The pain persisted, and, a few weeks later, Cassidy was diagnosed with melanoma. By the time of her diagnosis, the cancer had spread throughout her body. Cassidy's health rapidly deteriorated, and her final performance was in September 1996. At the performance, she had used a walker to reach the stage, sang "What a Wonderful World" in front of an audience of friends, and was subsequently admitted to Johns Hopkins Hospital.[citation needed]
Eva Cassidy died on November 2, 1996, at the age of 33. She was posthumously inducted into the Hall of Fame of the Washington Area Music Association.
Getting Out
Eva Cassidy Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
I'm going far far away
I'm getting out of this town
Not a thing could make me stay
I said I'm leaving here baby
So get out of my way yeah
I'm getting tired of your talking
Said your car broke down last evening
Said you couldn't make it down my way
But I saw you with another
And now you couldn't make me stay
You're always lying
You're never home
You're treating people wrong boy
And it's time for me to go
So I'm leaving
And there's one thing you should know
I've rigged your house with explosives
And that sucker's gonna blow
I'm getting out of this town
I'm getting out of this town
I'm getting out of this town baby
I'm getting out of this town
I said I'm leaving here baby
So just get out of my way yeah
The lyrics to Eva Cassidy's song "Getting Out" paint a vivid picture of a person who has had enough of a situation or a relationship and has decided to make a clean break. The song's protagonist is leaving a town that has become too small for them, and they are determined to go far away to seek new opportunities and a fresh start. The tone of the song is assertive, with the singer declaring that nothing can make them stay.
As the song progresses, we learn that the singer is leaving a person behind as well. This person is described as a liar, a cheater, and someone who mistreats others. The singer has had enough of this person's lies and empty promises, and they are determined to cut ties and move on. The explosive line at the end of the song is likely a metaphor for the emotional baggage the singer is leaving behind. They want to make a dramatic exit and leave their former life behind once and for all.
Line by Line Meaning
I'm getting out of this town
I am leaving this town behind me
I'm going far far away
I am going to a distant place
Not a thing could make me stay
I have made up my mind to leave, and there's nothing that could make me change it
I said I'm leaving here baby
I have communicated my decision to leave to you, my partner
So get out of my way yeah
Please do not try to stop me, I need to leave
I'm getting tired of your talking
I am tired of listening to your words
You never mean just what you say
You often say things that you do not really mean
Said your car broke down last evening
You told me your car had broken down yesterday evening
Said you couldn't make it down my way
You told me you could not come to where I was
But I saw you with another
I actually spotted you with someone else
And now you couldn't make me stay
Your actions have made me more determined to leave
You're always lying
You have a habit of not telling the truth
You're never home
You are hardly ever at home
You're treating people wrong boy
You are not treating people well, and that is not acceptable
And it's time for me to go
It is high time for me to leave
So I'm leaving
I am actually going away now
And there's one thing you should know
I have something important to tell you
I've rigged your house with explosives
I have set up explosives in your house (not to be taken literally!)
And that sucker's gonna blow
Your house is going to explode (this is a metaphor!)
I'm getting out of this town baby
I am leaving this town, my dear
I'm getting out of this town
Like I said before, I am leaving this town
I said I'm leaving here baby
Just in case you forgot, I am leaving this place
So just get out of my way yeah
Please refrain from trying to hold me back, I need to go
Lyrics © O/B/O APRA AMCOS
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind
Joe Calhoun
Love this. Eva is awesome
NareyBrahms
wow, absolutely NO mistaking that voice.
Vitor Monteiro
Maravilhoso
Mitt Obama
I forgot about this song. It's so good. The one I remember is the rocky song which I'm trying to locate.
Found it. Wiki saves me again. "End The Rain", my fave in the album.
Liz Bowen
Love and miss her!
Richard Hanbury
Wow
Richard Hanbury
Totally agree
Joe Calhoun
Richard Hanbury it’s awesome
Peter Wagner
52 thumbs up? that cant be right