One night in 1971, Richard Carpenter was taking a break from all things musical and decided to treat himself to a movie. He chose “Lovers and Other Strangers” starring Cloris Leachman, Bea Arthur and Diane Keaton.

Well, his ears perked up when he heard the movie’s theme song, “For All We Know,” sung by a guy named Larry Meredith. He thought it would be a perfect match for Karen’s voice…and checked into it right away.

He discovered it was written by jazz trumpeter Fred Karlin and two guys from the group Bread who WEREN’T named David Gates: Robb Royer and Jimmy Griffin.
In short order, Richard and Karen recorded and released “For All We Know,” and it was a major success, reaching #1 on the Adult Contemporary chart and #3 on The Hot 100.

And then the song won the Academy Award for “Best Song.” BUT because they were not members of the Screen Actors Guild, the Carpenters were not allowed to sing the song at the awards ceremony!  Petula Clark sang it instead.

Tough break, but nevertheless, Richard had found a “Great Song of 1971” and The Carpenters recorded the definitive version–for North America.I

n the UK, however, a very different version of the song was a major hit for Shirley Bassey, peaking at #6 and spending 24 weeks on the chart!

You can check out both versions by clicking the links below.

Carpenters:

Shirley Bassey: