Claudia Beechman began her musical career at the age of fifteen as a folk singer, accompanying herself on guitar and singing in coffeehouses in South Jersey and Philadelphia. After receiving a B. A. in French from Rutgers University, she went to Paris, where she studied acting at the Theatre Ecole Tania Balachova.

Returning to Philadelphia, she learned the guitar accompaniment to Piaf songs and began singing them in Philadelphia clubs and cafes, such as La Truffe, the Head House Tavern, Wildflowers, and the Cafe Erlanger. After a quick rise to local fame, which included several television appearances, she went to Canada to perform the lead female role in Jacques Brel is Alive and Well and Living in Paris.

Ms. Beechman continued to perform regularly until she took a hiatus to raise a family. Meanwhile, she expanded her repertoire of French songs with a piano accompanist and again began appearing around Philadelphia, performing at the Commissary Piano Bar, Barclay Hotel, and other cabaret venues, as well as doing several benefit concerts.

Gradually, she developed a recital format that combines elements of show business and academe, with songs that run the gamut from Piaf to Poulenc, including personal, historical, and sometimes humorous commentary on the place of each song in the history of French popular music. She has presented this concert-lecture repertoire in many settings, including the Cosmopolitan Club (for the Alliance Française), Chestnut Hill College, the Meadowbrook School, the University of Pennsylvania, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, and Montgomery County College.

Her 1994 recording, Parlez-moi d'amour, includes songs of Edith Piaf, Charles Trenet, Jacques Brel, and other French composers. In 1996, she joined her sister, Broadway star Laurie Beechman, for a duet of Brel's "If We Only Have Love" on Laurie's most recent album No One is Alone. Claudia recently completed her first solo CD, Souvenirs de Paris. Recent cabaret engagements include Odette's in New Hope and Triad in New York.

Please contact the webmaster, Faith Burwasser, with any feedback you may have on this site.