There are plenty of reasons to prejudicially favor the “original” recording of a song, even when it may not be the “best” version. American pop music has a long and ugly history of artistic appropriation and theft, after all. Sometimes the original version of a song captures a historical moment or the spirit of a performer, even when it lacks the virtuosic skill or artistic interpretation of its remake. And I think there is something mysterious and mystical about the organic connection between an artist and the art they produce that seems worthy of respecting for reasons that have nothing to do with “ownership.”
On the other hand, one of the truly great things about songwriting, as every songwriter knows, is that songs can be reshaped, rescored, reformed, and reinterpreted. Mediocre songs, in the hands of an attentive and careful performer, can become great. And great songs can become greater.
My pick for today “I Will Always Love You” was already a great song in the hands of its original writer/performer, Dolly Parton. When Parton wrote it in 1974, the women whose cover would later transform it into one of most epic ballads of all time was only 11 years old. That women’s name was Whitney Houston. In 1992, almost two decades after Parton’s Jolene album was released, Whitney Houston was in the process of parlaying her already-stellar musical career into a shot at the silver screen. She had just been cast as the female lead (alongside Kevin Costner) in The Bodyguard. Her rendition of “I Will Love You” was the theme song of the film and, fair or not, her cover would forever become the version of Parton’s song. Here it is:
All due respect to Dolly, but Whitney absolutely slayed this song.
I think Whitney found in the song another level, another intensity, another potency and force, one that was just there waiting to be unleashed in the original. (For the record, I also think that if Dolly had re-recorded this song in the early 90’s, she would have found that other level, too.) Dolly’s original was tender, vulnerable, and sweet from start to finish. It was the ballad of a poor girl from Appalachia: innocent, young, and in love. It fell squarely into a long line of country ballads by dedicated and longsuffering white women who stand by their man. Whitney’s cover of “I Will Always Love You” starts out tender, vulnerable, and sweet, just like the original…
But Whitney is not a poor white girl from Appalachia.
And so, Whitney slowly builds, she gains strength and confidence and intensity, throughout the first half of her cover. We hardly see it coming, but we can feel the steady change in emphasis from “I will always love you” to “I will always love you.” Verse by verse, we come to understand that Whitney’s is not a song about a women, broken, promising to stand by the man who broke her. Hers is a song about a women, fierce, whose love for her man cannot be broken. She’s not clinging to you, sir. She’s holding you up.
Then, at the 3:10 mark, Whitney delivers the coup de grâce, the “let me say it a little louder for the people in the back,” the OMG GOOSEBUMPS key-change that is the moment that makes this cover better than the original.
Dolly Parton’s and Whitney Houston’s are two of the greatest female voices of all time. I only regret that they never sang this song as a duet, not even once. Though, I suspect that if they had, every other female vocalist would’ve just realized the game was over, packed up their stuff, and gone home.
Runners-up for #30DaySongChallenge, Day 15:
- Three Dog Night’s “Try A Little Tenderness” (original by Otis Redding)
- Johnny Cash’s “Hurt” (original by Nine Inch Nails)
- Christina Aguilera, L’il Kim, Mya, and Pink’s “Lady Marmalade” (original by Patti Labelle)
- The Fugees’ “Killing Me Softly” (original by Roberta Flack)