Howard Carpendale

Howard Carpendale (January 14, 1946) is a South African-born singer who enjoyed great popularity as a Schlager music performer in the 1960s. Born in the city of Durban, he moved to Europe in 1966 after a series of unsuccessful attempts to make it as an Elvis impersonator in his native South Africa. He first settled in England, where he played small venues with a short-lived beat group, and then relocated to Germany. There, he was signed by the Cologne-based Electrola label and made his debut with the album Lebenslänglich, which sold over 60,000 units. In 1969, he scored his first big hit with a German cover of the Beatles' "Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da." Despite this success, his first few albums didn't perform as expected and the label almost terminated his contract. Howard Carpendale reverted this situation during the 1970s, producing a string of Top 10 hit singles that included "Du fängst den Wind niemals ein" (1974) "Deine Spuren im Sand" (1975), "Tür an Tür mit Alice" (1977), and "Ti amo" (1977). From there on, he became a mainstay of the German charts, releasing gold-selling albums such as Mein Weg zu dir (1979), Hello Again (1984), and Carpendale (1987). After a slew of moderately successful records during the 1990s, he announced his retirement from the music industry in 2003 due to health reasons. Four years later, he returned to the charts with 2007's 20 Uhr 10, a platinum-certified album that climbed to Number 4 on the German charts. It was followed by the Top 5 entries Stark (2009), Das alles bin ich (2011), Viel zu lang gewartet (2013), Das ist unsere Zeit (2015), and Wenn nicht wir (2017). In 2022, Howard Carpendale teamed up with singer-songwriter Eric Philippi for the charity single "Weiße Taube," inspired by Russia's recent invasion of Ukraine.