Karen Carpenter

Karen Anne Carpenter (March 2, 1950 Ô[][] February 4, 1983) was an American singer and drummer. She and her brother, Richard, formed the 1970s duo The Carpenters. She was a drummer of exceptional skill, but she is best remembered for her vocal performances of idealistic romantic ballads of true love. The Carpenters signature song is "We've Only Just Begun" which remains a popular wedding ballad. She suffered from anorexia nervosa, an eating disorder of extreme weight loss dieting, which was a little-known illness at the time. Although she had begun recovery with a doctor supervised program and regained 30 lbs, permanent damage to her body had been sustained from the years of extreme weight loss dieting and she died at the age of 32. Her death was attributed to heart failure, from complications related to her illness, which caused her to believe mistakenly that she needed to lose weight.