[July 19th was a doubly significant day for Elvis Presley: on July 19, 1954, his debut single was released; and on July 19, 1977, what would be his final album dropped. So this week I’ll AmericanStudy a handful of layers to the Elvis mythos, leading up to a special post on cultural representations of Presley!]
On the
differences between influential and interesting, and why even the former can be
problematic.
It seems
to me that you can’t tell the story of American popular music in the 20th
century—and thus the story of American popular music period—without
including Frank Sinatra and Elvis Presley in
prominent roles. Indeed, given each man’s forays into acting, entrepreneurship, and
other cultural and social arenas, I’m not
sure you could leave them out of a broader 20th century history of
America either. In their own ways, and in their own particular, most successful
periods (Sinatra’s career extended well into Presley’s, of course, but he was
at his most successful in its first couple decades, between 1935 and about
1955; Presley rose to prominence in the mid-1950s and was at his peak from then
until about 1970), the two artists dominated
their respective musical genres time and again, leaving
legacies that extend well beyond record sales or awards (although both are
among the most
successful artists of all time as measured
in those ways as well).
So I
wouldn’t necessarily argue with definitions of Sinatra and Elvis as among the
most influential musical artists of all time (although I might, in a moment,
argue that point too). But influential isn’t the same as interesting, and on
that score both artists fall short for me. Partly that’s just about taste and
how there’s, y’know, no accounting for it (de
gustibus, non est disputandum, as our Roman friends knew); I’m not a big
fan of either crooners or rockabilly, and thus likely outside of the ideal
audience for either man’s biggest hits or signature styles. But my point here
isn’t simply about my personal tastes, which I don’t expect are hugely
interesting either—I’m thinking as well about the nature of the men’s
mainstream popularity and prominence. Despite the unquestionable (if, in
retrospect, very silly) controversy
over Presley’s hips, that is, I would argue that both men
succeeded as consistently as they did because they were largely
unobjectionable, hitting cultural sweet spots with regularity in a way that
doesn’t seem as interesting as artists who push the envelope or challenge
norms.
Moreover,
I’m not sure that describing these two artists as influential is entirely
justified either. After all, a significant percentage
of both men’s songs were written by
other songwriters or were covers of other artists; clearly
their stunning voices and signature styles played a prominent role in making
the songs as successful as they were, but I don’t know that simply singing and
performing someone else’s songs qualifies an artist as influential. To be
clear, I’m not trying to rehash the old argument about Presley exploiting
African American music; that issue is part of the Elvis story to be sure, but
the truth (as I argued at length in Monday’s post) is that a great deal of
early rock and roll, if not indeed the entire genre, crossed racial and
cultural boundaries. Instead, I’m simply trying to differentiate between what
we might call performers and artists, and to argue that those whom we would
locate in the former category (such as two men whose most consistent successes
were as performers singing others’ words, or similarly as actors reciting
others’ lines) might be more important than they were influential or
interesting.
Next
ElvisStudying tomorrow,
Ben
PS. What
do you think? Other takes on Elvis?
No comments:
Post a Comment