The Persistence of Sentiment: Display and Feeling in Popular Music of the 1970s by Mitchell Morris (review)

In The Persistence of Sentiment: Display and Feeling in Popular Music of the 1970s, author Mitchell Morris begins to unpack some of the many parcels of meaning contained within sentimental songs of the 1970s. From The Waltons to Will and Grace, Morris uses television, comic strips, film, literary theory, history, economics, and music analysis to approach the music from multiple perspectives. Although he sometimes leads by a circuitous route, readers curious as to why, for example, Cher’s farewell tour lasted three years, and concluded eight years before the release of her most recent and highest-charting album, will enjoy the unexpected journey.

Chapter 1 is not only an introduction to the text but is also the chapter that positions the book within existing scholarship on music of the 1970s. In chapter 2, Morris addresses black masculinity in the United States and the increased economic opportunities available for black Americans after the civil rights movement, focusing on Barry White as his central example. Similarly, chapter 3 addresses economic issues of black artists as well, this time concentrating on the style of soft soul generally, rather than on a single person in particular. Morris considers masculinity from a different perspective in chapter 4, which centers on the “unmanly” Barry Manilow (p. 90). Morris turns from masculinism to feminism in chapter 5, “The Voice of Karen Carpenter,” focusing especially on Carpenter’s vocal delivery in recordings. Morris is notably interested in Carpenter’s appeal to young gay men, a constituency that is also central to the last two chapters of the book: on Cher and on Dolly Parton, respectively. The last chapter is especially intriguing since, as an artist working in the field of country music, Parton’s core audience is generally more conservative than, say, Barry White’s. One way that Morris connects the different subjects of his chapters is by weaving them throughout the book. Excluding the first chapter, which mentions all of his subjects, and excluding the chapters specifically dedicated to each of his subjects, Barry White also appears in chapters 3 and 4; Barry Manilow in chapters 5 and 6; Karen Carpenter in chapters 4, 6, and 7; Cher in chapter 7; and Dolly Parton in chapter 6.

Morris gently chides his academic peers who might view the music in his book as “too popular to be impressive” (p. 2). The music he addresses was certainly quite popular, but other acts were even more popular and have been impressive enough to warrant serious music studies (Elvis Presley, the Beatles, Michael Jackson, Madonna). Even focusing narrowly on the 1970s, he does not address many of the most popular acts of that decade (Pink Floyd, Queen, AC/DC, ABBA, the Eagles, Genesis, Journey), including some that strike me, at least, as impressive. So the music in Morris’s book is not really “too popular to be impressive.” But it might be too commercial. For example, because Barry White often performed wearing velvet, spangles, or sequins, because Barry Manilow has written many successful jingles for television commercials, and because Dolly Parton is part owner and namesake of the Dollywood theme park in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee, some scholars have found it difficult to take their work seriously. As Morris shows, however, we should.

Morris approaches music analysis from a variety of perspectives, as the following samples from his close reading of Barry White’s “Love’s Theme” demonstrate (pp. 38–42). He sometimes focuses on music’s social function, as when he describes the quality of the song’s opening: “utterly recognizable, it signals listeners that a song they love is about to play and gives them a moment to grab a partner and head out to the dance floor” (p. 38). At other times, he borrows from literary theory. About a particular...