Shapiro was born at Bethnal Green Hospital in the East End district of Bethnal Green, London. Her early childhood was spent in a Clapton council house in the London borough of Hackney, where she attended Northwold Primary School and Clapton Park Comprehensive School until Christmas 1961. She is the granddaughter of Russian Jewish immigrants; her parents, who were piece-workers in the garment industry, attended Lea Bridge Road Synagogue. The family moved from Clapton to the Victoria Park area of Hackney, on the Parkside Estate, when she was nine. "It was, and remains, a beautiful place," she said in a 2006 interview.
Although too poor to own a record player, Shapiro's parents encouraged music in their home (she had to borrow a neighbour's player to hear her first single). Shapiro played banjolele as a child and sang with her brother Ron occasionally in his youth club skiffle group. She had a deep timbre to her voice, unusual in a girl not yet in her teens: school friends gave her the nickname "Foghorn".
Aged ten, Shapiro was a singer with "Susie and the Hula Hoops," (with her cousin, 60s singer, Susan Singer) a school band which included Marc Bolan (then using his real name of Mark Feld) as guitarist. At 13 she started singing lessons at The Maurice Burman School of Modern Pop Singing, based in London's Baker Street, after the school produced singing star Alma Cogan. "I had always wanted to be a singer. I had no desire to slavishly follow Alma's style, but chose the school merely because of Alma's success", she said in a 1962 interview. Burman's connections eventually led her to a young Columbia Records A&R man named John Schroeder, who recorded a demo of Shapiro singing "Birth of the Blues".
In 1961, aged fourteen, she had a UK No. 3 hit with her first single, "Don't Treat Me Like a Child" and two number one hits in the UK, "You Don't Know" and "Walkin' Back to Happiness". The latter did not top the UK chart until 19 October 1961, by which time Shapiro had reached 15, on 26 September. She had a No. 2 in 1962 with "Tell Me What He Said", achieving her first four single releases in the top three of the UK Singles Chart. Most of her recording sessions were at EMI's studios at Abbey Road in north west London. Her mature voice made her an overnight sensation, as well as the youngest female chart topper in the UK.
Shapiro's final UK Top Ten hit single was with the ballad "Little Miss Lonely", which peaked at No. 8 for two weeks in 1962. Shapiro's recording manager at the time was Norrie Paramor.
Before she was sixteen years old, Shapiro had been voted Britain's "Top Female Singer". The Beatles first national tour of Britain, in the late winter/early spring of 1963, was as one of her supporting acts. During the course of the tour, the Beatles had their first hit single and John Lennon and Paul McCartney wrote the song "Misery" for her, but Shapiro did not record the composition. In 1995, during a This is Your Life highlighting her life and career, Shapiro revealed, "It was actually turned down on my behalf before I ever heard it, actually. I never got to hear it or give an opinion. It's a shame, really." Shapiro lip-synched her then-current single, "Look Who It Is", on the British television programme Ready Steady Go! with three of the Beatles (John Lennon, Ringo Starr and George Harrison).
In 1962, Shapiro appeared as herself in the Billy Fury film Play It Cool, and played the lead female role in Richard Lester's movie, It's Trad, Dad!, which co-starred another early 60s hitmaker, Craig Douglas. On 31 December 1969, Shapiro appeared on the BBC/ZDF co-production Pop Go The Sixties, singing "Walkin' Back to Happiness".
By the time she was in her late teens, her career as a pop singer was on the wane. With the new wave of beat music and newer female singers such as Dusty Springfield, Cilla Black, Sandie Shaw and Lulu, Shapiro appeared old-fashioned and emblematic of the pre-Beatles, 50s era. As her pop career declined, Shapiro turned to cabaret appearances, touring the workingmen's clubs of the North East of England. Her final cabaret show took place at Peterlee's Senate Club on 6 May 1972, where she announced she was giving up touring as she was "travel-weary" and had had enough of "living out of a suitcase". Later, after a change of mind, she branched out as a performer in stage musicals, and jazz (being her first love musically).
She played the role of Nancy in Lionel Bart's musical, Oliver! in London's West End and appeared in a British television soap opera, Albion Market, where she played one of the main characters until it was taken off air in August 1986.
Between 1984 and 2001, she toured extensively with legendary British jazz trumpeter Humphrey Lyttelton and his band, whilst still performing her own jazz and pop concerts. Her one-woman show "Simply Shapiro" ran from 1999 to the end of 2002, when she finally bade farewell to show business.
Her autobiography, published in 1993, was entitled Walking Back to Happiness. She appeared as a guest on BBC Radio 4's 'The Reunion' in August 2012. In March 2013 she appeared on BBC Radio 3's 'Good Morning Sunday'
Helen Shapiro has been married since 31 August 1988 to John Judd (real name, John Williams), an actor with numerous roles in British television and cinema.
I Don't Care
Helen Shapiro Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
And let me lonely
I go around with somebody new
But I don't care
What a fool I was to think you were true
I loved you only
I never thought we'd ever go through
Guess, I'll have to start going places
Look around and find some new faces
I'll be pickin' over the traces
I don't care what happens to me
You're not the only fish in the sea
So I'm not waitin'
Don't you think you're gonna come back to me
For I don't care
Now, I know that all is said and done
You will always be the only one
Talkin' to yourself is never fun
I must run to someone new
What a fool I was to think you were true
I loved you only
I never thought we'd ever be through
But I don't care
Guess, I'll have to start going places
Look around and find some new faces
I'll be pickin' over the traces
I don't care what happens to me
You're not the only fish in the sea
So I'm not waitin'
Don't you think you're gonna come back to me
For I don't care, I don't care, I don't care
In this song, the singer expresses her indifference towards her ex-lover and his actions. He has moved on to someone new, leaving her alone to find her own new partner. Despite the pain of the breakup, the singer declares that she doesn't care because she was a fool to believe that he was true to her. She had trusted him and loved him wholeheartedly, thinking that they would never break up. However, now that she's been left behind, she'll have to move on and look for someone new.
The singer's resolution to move on is clear in her announcement that she will start "going places" and looking "around to find some new faces." She recognizes that there are other fish in the sea, and thus, she is not waiting for her ex to come back to her. She is resolutely moving on, no matter what happens to her. The singer acknowledges that talking to oneself when hurt is a lonely experience, and thus, she must find someone new to fill the void.
Overall, this song emphasizes the central theme of moving on and acknowledging that the world is full of possibilities. The singer recognizes that she is not alone and that she is capable of finding someone new to love.
Line by Line Meaning
You gone and found somebody new
You have chosen someone else to be with
And let me lonely
And made me feel alone
I go around with somebody new
I have started seeing someone else
But I don't care
But I am not bothered by it
What a fool I was to think you were true
I was foolish to believe you were sincere
I loved you only
I only loved you
I never thought we'd ever go through
I never thought we would break up
But I don't care
But it doesn't matter to me anymore
Guess, I'll have to start going places
I guess I will have to start going out more
Look around and find some new faces
And meet new people
I'll be pickin' over the traces
I will be trying to forget about you
I don't care what happens to me
I am not concerned about what happens to me
You're not the only fish in the sea
There are other people out there
So I'm not waitin'
So I am not waiting for you
Don't you think you're gonna come back to me
Don't think you can come back to me
For I don't care
Since it doesn't matter to me
Now, I know that all is said and done
Now I know it's over
You will always be the only one
You will always hold a special place in my heart
Talkin' to yourself is never fun
It is not enjoyable to talk to yourself
I must run to someone new
I must find someone else to be with
I don't care, I don't care, I don't care
I really don't care about you anymore
Lyrics © TuneCore Inc., Universal Music Publishing Group, Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC, Warner Chappell Music, Inc.
Written by: LAMONT HERBERT DOZIER, ERNESTO DAVID JR. SHAW, KENNETH IFILL, VICTOR SANTIAGO, KIAM HOLLEY
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind