It’s established pop music history that classic 50s songs
like Sh-Boom, Tweedlee Dee, Hearts of
Stone, and many others were recorded by black artists on minor labels
before they were “covered” by white artists on major labels and became major
hits. And it’s generally felt by many fans of the original versions that the
original artists were “cheated” out of the glory due them by “inferior” cover
versions by white artists. They feel that the cover versions “whitewashed” the
soul right out of the originals by making them smoother and slicker, and more
acceptable to “mainstream” audiences. To these people, the originals are the
real thing, and the cover versions are (racial pun not intended) pale
imitations that really had no right to exist.
As a music history person, I’m not sure that I ever felt
that strongly, although once I discovered the original versions of songs I’d
heard for years by the Penguins and
others, I discovered that I generally liked the rougher versions better. As a
music history person, I knew that everyone borrows from everyone else. In fact,
I even wrote about it a few years ago.
However, I had a spectacular revelation at a barbershop
harmony concert about a year ago. Here different barbershop groups, male and
female, got together to present two or three favorite songs, done in barbershop
style. These ranged from old barbershop classics to current hits. And as I
listened to them sing these songs, it hit me…
The people who covered those 50s songs by black artists
didn’t “steal” anything from anyone. They didn’t “whitewash” the soul out of
anything. They simply did those same songs in a different style…a style that
was popular with the mainstream audiences of the day. And they didn’t cheat
those black artists out of their glory either, because the original versions
weren’t going to be played on mainstream radio stations or bought by mainstream
audiences anyway; they’d remain in the province of people who listened to what
were then called “race” radio stations and bought “race” records.
The composers of those songs, however…well they cried all
the way to the bank, having made money off of both versions.
Why is it that we feel that the original artist is the only
one who has a right to have a hit with a particular song?
Let’s take a look at I
Can’t Stop Loving You. Ray Charles wasn’t the first person to record it.
That honor goes to country singer Don Gibson in 1957. His version made it all
the way to number 7 on the Billboard
Country chart but only to 81 on the (mainstream) Hot 100. But when Ray Charles
recorded it in 1962, it went up to number 1 on the Hot 100, R&B, and Adult
Contemporary charts. It was a reversal of the trend of white artists getting
major hits off of songs first recorded by black artists.
I’m sure that Gibson, who also wrote the song, cried all the
way to the bank, when the Ray Charles version introduced the song to an even
wider audience and made it a standard. In fact, I bet that when he got that
royalty check from the Ray Charles version, he thought to himself, “life could
be a dream, sh-boom!”
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