Should the Yearwood record serve as a new paradigm for the genre?


The 9513 recently named the best albums of 2007 and the #1 spot went to Trisha Yearwood’s Heaven, Heartache, and the Power of Love. In fact, Jim Malec called Yearwood’s album “a testament to everything that’s good about contemporary, mainstream country music.”

Now, Nashville is definitely not the homogenous collective that those of us in California and Texas tend to make it out to be (i.e “That damn Nashville!”), but let’s set that aside for a moment and imagine that Nashville acted singularly in issuing the following statement:



If Nashville did pursue the goal stated above, would that be a good thing? Should the Yearwood record serve as a new paradigm for the genre?

First off, it wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world, that’s for sure. I loved the album and have actually recommended it to friends, which I generally don’t do with mainstream albums.

Furthermore, aside from the disconnected successes of artists like Norah Jones or Michael Bublé, there isn’t a lot happening for fans of the mature popular song and country music is a sensible place for them to turn. Trisha’s album would be a perfect fit for those folks. The songs are well constructed and thought out, the performances are technically flawless, and the arrangements strive for emotion without any rough edges. As I’ve said before, the album is an admirable accomplishment.

On the other hand, there isn’t much hillbilly in the Trisha record. Hank Williams used to continually chide his Drifting Cowboy Band for playing licks that were too fancy. He’d reprimand them with a continual “keep it vanilla boys, keep it vanilla.” The production on the Yearwood album (much like the production on Sinatra records) was most decidedly not vanilla. And though I really enjoyed the songs on the Yearwood album, they sure didn’t have the “close-to-the-bone” feeling that distinguishes a lot of traditional country.

But what does that matter? Times change and we can’t always sound like Hank Williams, right? And besides, this sounds better than Hank Williams’ records. It’s called progress, ever heard of it?

First, I’ll reject the notion that the Yearwood record is a natural progression from Hank Williams, and that therefore their music is fundamentally the same. It’s not as if Hank Williams hadn’t ever heard Frank Sinatra, or Broadway musicals. If anything, the style of sophisticated, layered production featuring many pieces was more prominent in the past. Hank’s minimalist arrangements were the product of a conscience choice and his records, and other records that stand firmly in the traditional country genre, have chosen to be fundamentally different than the type of record Yearwood made.

I’d argue that in taking its cues from pop music, the Yearwood record takes a much more theatrical approach when working to communicate with its listeners.

In musical theatre, projection is key. The audience is far away and therefore difficult to communicate with. To ensure that communication is successful, actors exaggerate their movements and facial expressions, singers are trained with an emphasis on power and technique, and full orchestras set the emotional tone for the scene. Every ounce of drama is dictated to the audience. Arms swing out wide as tenors soar to high notes with strings, pianos and symbols crashing behind them. In order for the drama to fall on “deaf ears”, it would have to literally fall on deaf ears, as the players and musicians absolutely refuse to fail for lack of trying.

As thrilling as that all is, Hank Williams, and others before and since, choose to “keep it vanilla” and employed the opposite tactic. Like a speaker who draws the audience in by speaking more quietly, rather than more loudly, Hank kept it simple, clear, and devastating, but if you aren’t paying attention, you’d probably miss it.

Traditional country music, with it’s “boring” (read: simple) arrangements, its familiar melodies, and its unimaginative song forms, puts the lyric (the story), front and center. The focus isn’t on communicating the broader emotion to everyone in the theater; rather, the focus is on making sure that everyone who is paying attention will have a chance to experience a sublime moment of human specificity.

To use another metaphor, let’s imagine a picture. The bigger the picture is blown up, the fuzzier the details become. Similarly, the more exaggerated the expression of an individual’s quiet, chilling moment of heartbreak is, the less individual, the less quiet and ultimately the less chilling it becomes.

But there’s gold up in them pop music hills.

So should Nashville aspire to deliver the very best in American pop music to the masses? Hell who knows. Traditionalists like me everywhere are bemoaning the fact that “sad songs and waltzes aren’t selling this year” but the truth is, a decade full of Yearwood style releases would be way easier to swallow than a decade of Montgomery Gentry or Trace Adkins inspired releases. For sure.

Ultimately though, I’m not convinced that it’s a good thing that pop songwriters from Boston are making the trip to Nashville for no other reason than “that’s where songwriters go.” And I think that as tempting as it may be for Nashville to dress up as the center for sophisticated popular music in America, it would be better for it to go back to being the center for hillbilly songwriters who would rather “beat the devil” than tame the masses.