Harry, It Sucks!
Pictures of Harry Chapin
Following is a collection of various photographs of Harry through the years. These pictures were taken by his fans and their words are used to describe their photos.
Do you have any unique, funny pictures of Harry? Would you like to include them on this page with a paragraph or two telling the story? If so, drop me a note and I'd be happy to include them here.
After the years of promising myself I would go and never did, I finally got myself up to Ovens Park. If I could go back in time I'd kick myself for not going earlier! Not only was it fun it was beautiful.
Click here to view the photos.
This was a benefit show for World Hunger Year performed by Scott Sivakoff and a bunch of friends; including Dave Underwood, Susan Shaw, Wayne Kessler, and some other guys...Howard Fields, Ron Palmer and John Wallace showed up too. It was a very special night and the music kept coming and coming and getting better and better. The audience was able to coax Big John on stage, Ron Plamer's famous "Experiences and Lessons" came out, and Howard beat out the best beginning to Dance Band On The Titanic ever!
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This little get together was held after a John McMenamin Remembering Harry Chapin show and was arranged by some unnamed villains. The concept was simple; get together and listen to even more music. Jason Dermer's uncle happened to be the fire chief in a small town in Jersey and loaned us the fire department on Sunday (hence the name) and we set up and played for hours and hours. Everyone was welcome to play and sing and many did. Having a cello was a great addition that wasn't present in the previous evenings show.
Click here to view the photos.
The following four pictures are compliments of Donna Oliver from when she met him after concerts that she attended. Click on any of the images to get the full sized version.
These 1978 pictures of Harry are from the Cape Cod Melody Tent. We drove all the way down in Aug. just for the show and it was great. My second time seeing Harry, and it just so happened that Josh was there to dance for us while Harry sang 'Dancing Boy'.
The 1980 pictures are from a show in Lowell, Mass. I drove down after work in with 2 friends. It was in Dec. and as usual Harry stayed until the last fan left. We were among the last to leave, and Harry stayed and talked with us and was kind enough to let us take lots of pictures. It was the last time I saw Harry, and my next show would have been in Hampton Beach at the Casino, but it was not to be. It was of the most memorable nights of my life, and I'll always cherish the memory.
"This is a photo I took of HC at Croydon Fairfield Hall in February 81. I was fortunate to have front row seats (not cheap seats!!!) and half way through the concert Harry jumped off stage ran to the back of the theater and was gone a few minutes. He ran down back to the stage with a very large grin and announced to the audience this concert was his first-ever sellout concert in England. The audience went wild at the news.
A great man, I was fortunate to see him 3 times in England.
Phil Elcome eMail: philelc@email.msn.com
Middleton on Sea
West Sussex
England
Steven Cohn: "I met him on Sunday, May 3, 1998. There was a Harry Chapin Tribute, put on by the Steve Chapin Band, at Chapins Restaurant, "A Better Place to Be" in Columbus, Ohio. I wrote about it on the Harry's Friends site. As I mentioned in my story, when I turned my back and saw Jim (he and I were the first ones there), it was like looking right at Harry's face. To me, it was the same face.
Back in the "olden" days we couldn't just snap a picture from the television like we can today. So these three shots of Harry on The Tonight Show (circa 1978) were taken with a 35mm camera, sitting in a darkened room, crouched in front of the TV, trying to hold the camera real steady, and trying to time "the perfect shot." I was rather impressed with the outcome, even though by today's standards they are crummy. Click on the picture to see a larger version.
I went to a Harry Chapin concert in Chicago at the Aerie Crown Theatre in 1975 and thought I'd sneak in a camera to get some great shots of Harry in concert. Unfortunately, I used my mother's 110mm pocket camera, was a little bit stoned, and seated (as usual) in the cheap seats. I post them only so that you can have a good laugh.
At another Chapin concert, this time at Ravina Park in the Chicago-land area me and my girlfriend and another couple were laying on the grass relaxing before the concert. I had my head on Debi's lap and was staring at the blue sky and the clouds. Suddenly, a cloud floated by that (and I swear on my un-dead Mother's grave) that looked just like Harry's head! I pointed and proclaimed, "Look! A Cloud shaped like Harry's head!" and snatched up my camera and snapped a shot. Apparently, I was the only one who could see the remarkable resemblance (and I wasn't stoned either!) so the rest of the afternoon, they all were pointing at clouds proclaiming they looked like Harry's foot, or Harry's earlobe!
Unfortunately those clouds held rain and during the concert it started to pour! Which is disastrous for an outdoor concert. Harry, the band and the rich people were under a pavilion and Harry kept the concert going, despite loosing 3/4 of his audience. We stuck it out by ducking into the pavilion and the weather eventually cleared and I met Harry after the concert and got an autograph, a hand shake and Debi got a kiss from him (I was told that there was no tongues involved! We did not see any clouds shaped like Harry's tongue. <grin>)
We ran to the pavilion and left all of our stuff under a tree. Everything got soaked! What a waste of a perfectly good 126mm camera!
Click here to view pictures from that day.