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.
Kathy's Song
Eva Cassidy Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
Like a memory it falls
Soft and warm continuing
Tapping on my roof and walls
My mind's distracted and confused
My thoughts are many miles away
They lie with you when you're asleep
And as I watch the drops of rain
Weave their weary paths and die
I know that I am like the rain
There before the grace of you go I
In "Kathy's Song," Eva Cassidy sings about her longing for someone who is far away. She uses the imagery of rain to convey her emotions, describing the sound of the drizzle as a memory falling around her. The rain is described as "soft and warm continuing," creating a sense of comfort and familiarity. Despite this, Cassidy portrays herself as feeling "distracted and confused" and her thoughts are "many miles away," emphasizing her separation from the person she desires.
The lyrics reveal that Cassidy's thoughts are consumed by this person even when they are asleep, as she imagines kissing them at the start of the day. The final verse brings the rain imagery home, as Cassidy reflects on the drops of rain weaving their paths and dying. She identifies with the rain, acknowledging that she is also helpless before the grace of the person she admires. The lyrics are touching in their emotional resonance, with Cassidy's voice conveying a sense of longing and tenderness.
Line by Line Meaning
I hear the drizzle of the rain
I am able to hear the soft sound of the rain falling
Like a memory it falls
The sound of the rain is reminiscent of a past experience
Soft and warm continuing
The rain falls gently and consistently, creating a cozy ambiance
Tapping on my roof and walls
The sound of raindrops hitting the roof and walls of my surroundings is audible
My mind's distracted and confused
I am struggling to focus and think clearly
My thoughts are many miles away
My mind is preoccupied with thoughts that are far from my physical location
They lie with you when you're asleep
My thoughts are fixated on you while you sleep
Kiss you when you start the day
I wish to bestow a kiss upon you as you begin your day
And as I watch the drops of rain
As I continue to observe the raindrops falling
Weave their weary paths and die
The raindrops follow a path before disappearing
I know that I am like the rain
I understand that my existence is similar to that of the rain
There before the grace of you go I
I am grateful for the presence of you in my life, without which I may not exist
Lyrics © Universal Music Publishing Group, Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC
Written by: Paul Simon
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind
@jucameron
Paul Simon met Kathleen Mary “Kathy” Chitty at the very first English folk club in which he played, the Railway Inn Folk Club in Brentwood, Essex, on 12th April, 1964. Kathy who worked there was then 17, Paul was 22, and it appears to have been love at first sight.
A few weeks later Simon wrote "Homeward Bound" as he sat on Widnes Railway Station waiting for the train that would take him back to her. There's a plaque at the station recalling this event. Later that year he invited her to the US where they toured around mainly by bus.
Kathy returned to England on her own with Simon returning to her some weeks later. During this separation he wrote "America", clearly a love song to Kathy:
"Kathy, I'm lost," I said, though I knew she was sleeping
"I'm empty and aching and I don't know why"
During their separation he also wrote the immortal "Kathy’s Song", one of the most beautiful love songs ever written:
I gaze beyond the rain-drenched streets
To England where my heart lies.
My mind's distracted and diffused
My thoughts are many miles away
They lie with you when you're asleep
And kiss you when you start your day.
When he returned to London he recorded the album "The Paul Simon Songbook" that included Kathy’s Song, and had a photo of Simon and Kathy on the cover.
In the meantime, "The Sound of Silence" started to receive major air-play in America eventually becoming No 1 in the US charts in 1965. Simon felt the need to return to the US to continue his career but this meant splitting up with Kathy because she wanted no part of the crazy US music scene.
Kathy later married and brought up three children in a remote mountain village in North Wales where she still lives - she is now a grandmother. Now well into his 70s, Simon recalls their months together with great tenderness and says it was "by far the most peaceful time of my life".
In fact he didn't hear from her for over 20 years but after the success of "Graceland" she wrote to congratulate him. When, in 1991, Simon toured the UK, Kathy and her family attended his show in Sheffield. They met again in July 2004 after his "Old Friends Reunion Tour" stop at Hyde Park in London (where her three children now live).
@jimpowers9553
As a musician for 60 years, in my humble opinion, I think she had the most beautiful and powerful voice in the history of popular music.
@SpiritualSpectrum
double ditto
@russyeatman5631
More than Linda Ronstadt?
@barbaramonaco105
Eva Cassidy and Sandy Denny. Spectacular voices that were stilled too soon. Both passed away in their early thirties.
@golden.lights.twinkle2329
There are many beautiful, powerful voices.
@jeffhunt2778
Don't be overly humble, you know what you are talking about. She was stunning, but an even better person. When I found her I couldn't listen to anyone else for a year.
@apinnaclemarketing
My life is enriched by hearing her melodious voice . It makes me feel alive . Don't you?
@Dawn-Songs
I love her voice but it always makes me choke back tears for some treason . She had a wistfulness in her singing and a childlike quality . I actually like her version of this song better than Simon and Garfunkel , and love her guitar playing . 🤍
@brianmullins4851
Eva Cassidy, short lived, but long remembered. RIP beautiful lady.
@michaelward5670
Some gifts take ones breath completely away and render you unable to say much more than thank you. My God she was exquisitely lovely.