Female pop stars who attain the attributes of goddesses - emblematic names, signature fragrances, the floating hair of Botticelli’s "Venus " - tend to share a few qualities.
They are athletic vocalists, usually with multi-octave ranges, who can hold a note longer than most magicians can stay submerged in water. Their signature songs blend romantic axioms with the more current language of self-help. Their music is frequently dismissed as banal, yet often helps regular folk contemplate profundities, at weddings or funerals, or when a baby is born.
These traits link Whitney to Mariah to Shania to Celine to Faith to Beyoncé to Christina to Alicia, although each has her own strengths and quirks. But something subtler also connects them. Musically, they’re border jumpers. On the surface, they epitomize pop banality, but they regularly defy their home genres, blithely disregarding musical rules that hem in more admired (and usually male) pop practitioners. Whitney Houston set the template for this role by turning a country hit, Dolly Parton’s "I Will Always Love You," into a smash that redefined crossover R&B.
The mainstream’s pop goddesses also blur lines on the level of identity. Many are biracial. Celine Dion is bilingual. All pop stars are mandated to continually remodel themselves, but few do so as dramatically as Mariah Carey, who fled innocence (and Tommy Mottola) to become hip-hop’s super-sexy honey. Christina Aguilera’s been a teen sweetie, a sex radical and a retro vamp. Beyoncé, one suspects, hasn’t even begun to show us her thousand faces.
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Source: The Los Angeles Times
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JULY 19, 2007
