First new music in over five years from daughters of Tom Chapin, who along with legendary late brother Harry help comprise one of folk music’s most beloved families.
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The Chapin Sisters (L-R): Lily Chapin, Abigail Chapin. Photo
credit: Adam Goldberg.
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The Chapin Sisters
“Bergen Street”
Out Now
(Lake Bottom
Records)
Streaming Link:
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“There is an enduring warmth throughout this ode to
Brooklyn. A cathartic release and a farewell, not just to a place, but to the
memories which they bring back to life here. There is something magical going
on in this song that’s impossible not to be moved by.” — Folk
Radio UK
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The Chapin Sisters | “Bergen
Street” | Video Teaser
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The Chapin
Sisters | In The Press
“Compelling, lovely and stirring” — The New York Times
“Sisters who know from heart-tugging lyrics.” — Rolling Stone
“Ethereal harmonies.” — No Depression
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The Chapin
Family | Live
Harry Chapin
at 80: A Retrospective — The Chapin Family Live in Concert
Weds., April
26, 2023 @ Keswick Theatre (291 N Keswick Ave, Glenside, PA 19038)
Harry Chapin was one of our most passionate, political, prolific
and inspiring songwriters. This Long Island icon has reached a milestone
birthday — his 80th — and his
family feels a celebration is in order! In the long rich history of Family
Groups in American Roots Music, The
Chapin Family has a special place. When these singers, songwriters and
extraordinary live performers come together, magic happens.
Tom Chapin, Steve Chapin,
Jen Chapin, and The Chapin Sisters (Abigail
Chapin and Lily Chapin) are all
award-winning musical artists with active careers and multiple recordings, who
just happen to be related, and who love making music together.
Two generations of the musical Chapin Family will gather to bring the songs of Harry Chapin to life. Backed by The Harry Chapin Band (including Big John Wallace and Howard Fields), the Chapin Family will perform Harry’s
classic songs, including “Cat’s In The
Cradle,” “Taxi,” “W•O•L• D,” and many more.
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The Chapin Sisters | About
The Chapin
Sisters make you long to return to a
place you may have never been before.
“Bergen
Street” is the new single (Out Now, Lake Bottom Records) from Abigail
and Lily Chapin, the sibling members
of what looks like a folk music dynasty, but in reality, is a proud family that
has been making music for decades in the most humble of traditions.
Father Tom
Chapin is a Grammy®-winning
singer-songwriter, late uncle Harry
Chapin is a legendary artist and social justice activist (his #1 hit “Cat’s In The Cradle” is a timeless
classic), and grandfather Jim Chapin
was an esteemed jazz drummer.
The sisters’ first new music since 2017’s Ferry
Boat, “Bergen
Street,” which describes a stretch of Brooklyn road with its everyday “soot
in the window ruts” and “air that smells of the tire dust” is an example of
this humble and expertly crafted music-making.
It is voiced with stirring sisterly “blood harmony” in
a way that only a family band – especially one with such a long history – can
do.
“Lily wrote
‘Bergen Street’ as she was leaving
Brooklyn to move back to the Hudson Valley village that we grew up in,” Abigail explains. “It’s a bittersweet
ode. Not a sad moment, exactly, but wistful.
“We thought we’d be city people forever, but during
the pandemic, I eventually did the same thing. We packed up our little families
and moved back to the woods and the grass and the driveways.”
“I always write songs about places I leave,” Lily confides. “When I was first
writing ‘Bergen Street,’ I was still
feeling the sting of leaving the city behind. I think it never goes away. The
first time I played it for my daughter, she cried.
“It’s hard to process feelings of loss and leaving
things behind that you love. This song allowed me to remember what was unique
and to allow the memories to become more vivid.”
Brooklyn memories that The Chapin Sisters have built over a lifetime, and for their
family, many lifetimes.
“Our family is a Brooklyn family,” Abigail says. “Our Manhattan-born grandmother
claimed she had never been to Brooklyn until she moved there at age 30, but her
kids adopted a strong identity and connection to Brooklyn Heights.
“The six boys played their first concerts there as The Chapin Brothers in the early 60s
and even though the brothers eventually drifted out of the neighborhood,
Brooklyn Heights has remained our family touchstone.”
Lily adds, “The history of Brooklyn is steeped in our
childhoods. Our Dad’s childhood, his brothers, Grace Church choirboys... Our
Uncle Steve and family friend Phil Forbes pushing a piano up and down the
street in Red Hook to play tunes at Fort Defiance.”
Even though the sisters are now building their
memories outside of Brooklyn, the familial togetherness continues, and not just
in front of the microphone.
“We recorded ‘Bergen
Street’ at Lily’s house,” Abigail says, “This was surprisingly
challenging in ways.
“We’ve got four young children between us, and with
our husbands involved in the recording process as well, we needed to rope in
grandparents to take turns watching babies, cooking meals, doing dishes, and
swinging on swings in the yard.”
This style of working is giving the new recordings by The Chapin Sisters an even more
intimate sound, and though it may slow down the process, the process benefits.
“We are slowly making our way through our recordings,
one song at a time,” Abigail says. “It’s
been interesting to approach it this way, focusing on one thing until it’s
done, instead of flitting around from song to song.
“I guess leaving the city is a theme in our lives
right now, and it is showing up heavily in this batch of songs that will become
our next album.”
Like the brothers who drifted, it is hard to imagine
the sisters leaving Brooklyn behind for good.
When I come back
Will the streets recognize my feet?
Will the wind recognize
The air that I breathe?
This thoughtful tribute to Bergen Street – the place The Chapin Sisters left – assures that
it will never leave them.
“Bergen
Street” is the new single by The Chapin Sisters, out now via Lake Bottom Records.
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The Chapin
Sisters | Links
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