Cyndi Lauper

Cyndi Lauper CD single "Stay", 2004

Cynthia Ann Stephanie Lauper (born June 22, 1953), better known as Cyndi Lauper, is a Grammy Award-winning singer and Emmy Award-winning film, television and theatre actress. Her melodic voice and wild costumes have come to epitomize the 1980s and New Wave — the decade and genre in which she first came to fame. As a singer, she has sold more than 50 million copies of her albums worldwide.

Biography

Cyndi Lauper was born in Queens, New York to Swiss German-American Fred Lauper and Sicilian Italian-American Catrine Dominique. She has a sister (Elen) and a brother (Frank). At the age of 12, she learned how to play the guitar and started writing her own lyrics. She soon dropped out of High School and traveled to Canada, then returned to New York at a later time. She joined Doc West, a cover band from Long Island,and later joined another cover band Flyer. In 1977, due to damage to her vocal chords, Lauper took a year off and trained with a vocal coach. She returned in 1978 and performed her own material with her band, Blue Angel. In 1980, they released a self-titled album on Polydor Records. Despite much critical acclaim, the album "went lead" as Lauper says, and the band split soon afterwards. Lauper filed for bankruptcy and started working in retail stores but continued to sing cover songs to make ends meet.

In 1981, while singing in a local New York bar, Lauper met David Wolff, who took over as her manager and got her signed with Portrait Records, a subsidiary of Columbia Records. In December of 1983, She's So Unusual was released, which was a worldwide hit and made Lauper a household name. The album was a mixture of teen-friendly pop-rock, synthesized dance music, punk-edged vocals and a mainstream New Wave sound. The lead off single was "Girls Just Want to Have Fun", which quickly established itself as a female anthem, and its accompanying video proved very popular on MTV. Other hits from the album included: "Time After Time", a romantic ballad that would later be covered by over 70 artists, most notably Miles Davis; "She Bop", a paean to masturbation; "All Through the Night, a Jules Shear cover; and "Money Changes Everything", a slick cover of The Brains' New Wave number. She's So Unusual also included "When You Were Mine", a Prince cover, which was later released a promotional single in 1985. At the time, Lauper became very popular with teenagers, in part due to her quirky image, which took the popular late 1970s punk look and marked it to a mainstream audience. She spent the whole year (1984) on tour and promoting her album, at the end of the year, she was the first female to have four consecutive Billboard Hot 100 top-five hits from one album.

Lauper started out 1985 by participating on USA for Africa's famine-relief fund-raising single, "We Are the World". At the Grammys, she won a Grammy Award in the Best New Artist category and also received nominations for Album of the Year ("She's So Unusual") and Record of the Year ("Girls Just Want to Have Fun"). At the event, she appeared with WWF Superstar Hulk Hogan, who played her "bodyguard". In return, she made many appearances as herself in a number of WWF's "Rock and Wrestling" events, where she was supposedly the manager of Wendy Richter, their entrance music was "Girls Just Want to Have Fun". This cross-promotion arranged by David Wolff and Vince McMahon also lead to a number of appearances with professional wrestlers (most notably Captain Lou Albano, who she met on an airplane during her Blue Angel days) appearing in her early videos. Lauper also contributed to "The Wrestling Album", under the pseudonym "Mona Flambé" as guest backing vocals. She later described the period as fun, but it became an increasing distraction to her musical ambitions, and largely stopped her WWF appearances after 1985. In July, she charted her next single, "The Goonies 'R' Good Enough" for the film "The Goonies".

Lauper released her second album, True Colors in 1986, revealing a more mature sound and sensibility, it reached number four on the Billboard 200. For this album, she wanted to be taken more seriously and increased her involvement both in production and songwriting. Guests on the album included: Nile Rodgers, Aimee Mann, Billy Joel and The Bangles. Although the album wasn't as successful as its predecessor, it contained a few hit singles, the title track, which went on to become her second Platinum number-one hit, "Change of Heart", "Boy Blue" and a cover of Marvin Gaye's "What's Going On". True Colors also featured the track "Maybe He'll Know", which was originally from the Blue Angel album. She also sang the jaunty theme song for the series "Pee-wee's Playhouse". The album has since sold 12 million copies worldwide. In promoting her album, Lauper traveled all over the globe for her True Colors World Tour.

In 1987, Lauper traveled to the former Soviet Union as part of a project to collaborate with Russian songwriters, her trip resulted in the song "Cold Sky", which appeared on the album Music Speaks Louder Than Words. She made her film debut in the 1988 quirky comedy, Vibes, alongside Jeff Goldblum and Peter Falk, as a psychic in search for a city of gold in South America. The film was poorly received by critics and commercially flopped. Her soundtrack contribution, "Hole in My Heart (All the Way to China)", also didn't chart into the Top 40, though it charted into the Hot 100. A Night to Remember, her third album, was released in 1989, though critically well-received, it was not a commercial success. The album spawned only one hit, "I Drove All Night", which was originally penned for Roy Orbison, although his version was not released until 1992, three years after Lauper's version and four years after his death. She also wrote and produced most of the album. A Night to Remember sold 5 million copies.

The following year, Lauper joined many other guests for Roger Waters' massive performance of The Wall in Berlin, performing "Another Brick in the Wall, Part II". She also was part of The Peace Choir, who did a version of John Lennon's "Give Peace a Chance". She co-starred with David Keith, Richard Belzer and David Thornton, who eventually became her husband, in the action-thriller, Off and Running, released in 1991. She starred as a small-time actress on the run from a murder. Lauper continued to act, in 1993 she played Michael J. Fox's ditzy secretary in Life with Mikey, which also starred Nathan Lane. Later in the year, she released the critically acclaimed fourth album Hat Full of Stars, but sales were poor. With a smooth new R&B sound, world music instrumentation, and samples and production by Junior Vasquez, she tackled such topics as spousal abuse and abortion.

12 Deadly Cyns... and Then Some released in 1995, was a greatest hits compilation that included two new tracks, one of which was a reworking of her first big hit, newly christened "Hey Now (Girls Just Want To Have Fun)". The album was released under a number of different titles, packaging and track listings around the world. Twelve Deadly Cyns sold over 4 million copies worldwide and she began a world tour to promote the album. Twelve Deadly Cyns was especially popular in the UK, reaching number two on the music charts, while the new "(Hey Now) Girls Just Want To Have Fun" hit number four.

Her fifth album 1997's Sisters of Avalon brought her back into the limelight. With subject matter even more adult than before, it was quickly embraced by the gay community for its dance and club stylings. The topicality of the album also contributed to its "pink" appeal: the song "Ballad of Cleo and Joe" addressed the complications of a drag queen's double life, while "You Don't Know" tackled the thorny issue of coming out. The album's singles were remixed to great acclaim, and Lauper began performing as a featured artist at gay pride events around the world. In 1999 she co-headlined a tour alongside Cher, and contributed a cover version of The Trammps's classic "Disco Inferno" to the soundtrack of the film A Night at the Roxbury, the remixed version become a club hit. She also garnered critical plaudits for her roles in several independent films including The Opportunists (with Christopher Walken). Lauper and Thornton also welcomed their son, Declan Wallace Thornton on November 19, 1997.

Lauper prepared her sixth album in 2001, Shine, which saw her returning to her early pop/rock sound without losing the "maturity" she had embraced on later records. Just weeks before the album's scheduled release, however, her label, Edel America Records, folded, and the tracks were leaked to the public. Although a five song EP of the same name was made available through her website and at Tower Records, the full length album concept was scrapped. She then undertook her second co-headlining tour with Cher in 2002. In 2003, an EP of remixes from the unreleased Shine album was sold on the Edel America Records website. Additionally Lauper's former label Sony issued a new greatest hits CD entitled The Essential Cyndi Lauper. She then re-signed with Sony/Epic Records and a cover album called Naked City was in the works.

In November 2003 an album of standards was released entitled At Last (formerly Naked City), which became a Top-40 hit in the U.S. and Australia. It showed off her skills as a unique interpreter and critics agreed that Lauper's voice - always a force to be reckoned with - was even stronger at age 50 that it had been in her heyday. In March of 2004 the full length Shine album was finally released, though exclusively in Japan. She was nominated for a 2005 Grammy award for "Best Instrumental Composition Accompanying a Vocal" for her interpretation of the song "Unchained Melody" on the At Last album.

The Body Acoustic was released in 2005, an album which featured acoustic reinterpretations of tracks from her back catalog as well as two new songs. It featured guest appearances by artists such as Shaggy, Ani DiFranco, Adam Lazzara and Sarah McLachlan. Since the album's release, Cyndi Lauper has been on the rise, especially in Canada. She continues to tour the world performing live and is noted as an energetic live performer. Despite not having released a proper follow-up to 1997's Sisters of Avalon, she has maintained a devoted dedicated fanbase and lives in New York with her husband and their son. As of 1998, Lauper also had a home in Stamford, Connecticut.^[1]

Discography

Samples

Download sample of "Time After Time" from She's So Unusual

Trivia

Married David Thornton in 1991, with the wedding presided over by Little Richard.
Son Declyn Wallace Thornton Lauper was born in 1997.
Wrote "Code of Silence" with Billy Joel. It marked the first time Joel shared a songwriting credit on one of his albums.
Was interested in recording "Voices Carry" by 'Til Tuesday but the band ultimately decided to record the song themselves for their debut album.
Co-wrote the title track of French-Canadian pop star Mitsou's 1992 EP Heading West
Before achieving musical fame, she worked at New York high-end thrift store "Screaming Mimi's".
On the classic game show Press Your Luck, there was a Whammy based on her.
Appears on Nellie McKay's sophomore album on the track Bee charmer.
She performs the title theme song for Pee Wee's Playhouse under the name of Ellen Shaw.

Selected Filmography

1985 The Goonies (Cameo)
1988 Vibes
1991 Off and Running
1993 Life With Mikey
1994 Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle (Cameo)
1999 The Opportunists
2006 The Naked Brothers Band (currently in post-production)

Tours

1984-1985 The Fun Tour
1986-1987 True Colors World Tour
1989 A Night To Remember World Tour
1993 Hat Full Of Stars Tour
1994-1995 Twelve Deadly Cyns World Tour
1996-1997 Sisters Of Avalon Tour 1997 with Tina Turner
1999 The Summer Tour with Cher
2001 The Shine Tour
2003-2004 The At Last World Tour
2005-2006 The Body Acoustic Tour

Notes

^ If You're Thinking of Living In/North Stamford, Conn.; In a Bustling City, a Rural Haven" an article by Eleanor Charles in New York Times Real Estate section, February 1, 1998, accessed September 10, 2006

External links

[1] If You're Thinking of Living In/North Stamford, Conn.; In a Bustling City, a Rural Haven" an article by Eleanor Charles in New York Times Real Estate section, February 1, 1998, accessed September 10, 2006

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