Is It Time For a Revival? A Second Coming: Is The Time At Hand?

James E Akenson

All the signs point to a coming revival if not the end-of-the-world. Or…at least the Second Coming of Christ. In the last days there shall be much coming and going. The King James Version (KJV) of the Bible 2^nd Timothy Chapter 3, Verses 2 and 3 makes clear the social media obsessions as women and “men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy. Without natural affection, truce breakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good.”

Like comedian Rodney Dangerfield experienced, people don’t respect other persons and their points of view anymore. Sin is rife and Las Vegas even touts its Sin City credentials. It’s just like Nashville Evangelist B.B. Pennington said “America has become a sex-obsessed nation and needs to turn back to the standards of purity found in the Bible…..that the nation’s appetite for sexual matters is being fed by the newsstands which are profiting of sin.” What B.B. Pennington said in 1932 in the Cookeville (Tennessee) Herald Citizen is true to many Evangelical Christians today. 

Mid-to-late summer was the traditional revival season with crops laid-by.  There was less to do out in the country. Today, thanks to technology you can have a revival anytime. Think Billy Graham and others.  With strong roots in the Evangelical Christianity of the U.S. South, Country Music ….as Randy Williams so aptly identified in his deep dive into the Sacred and Profane in his recent Tennessee Tech University dissertation…a split, a division, a dichotomy exists in Country Music.

The Evangelical Protestant Sacred and Profane division means Heaven and Hell, Saturday Sinner and Sunday Saint, Good and Evil, Right and Wrong…and the struggles we all experience whether we’re believers or not.  It made revivals necessary.

So…given that the traditional mid to late summer revival time will be with us before we know it. Given that some of my jeans are Rock Revival and True Religion. Given that there have been all sorts of revivals such as The Folk Revival of the 1940s-60s. Given that there was a New Traditionalist revival in the 1970s. Given that there seems to be a revival of interest in the 1990s Country Music…just take a look at the recent Grand Ole Opry FaceBook message.

Given that there is now a current revival of interest in the African American influence on Country Music.  Given the recent revival, resurgence of interest in the role of women in Country music, doesn’t it make sense that a revival, a sudden renewed interest, in someone who has had a significant impact on Country Music, but hasn’t been discussed much of late could be ready to happen? Let’s do some thinking about a possible Barbara Mandrell revival. She’s crossed my mind as a logical revival topic. 

It just might be time for scholars, journalists, bloggers, and all sorts of folks to suddenly revive, rediscover Barbara Mandrell. She deserves more than a brief 2021Taste of Country piece saying she retired to spend more time with her family. 

I saw Barbara Mandrell with Life Partner (LP) Mickie and her parents at the Grand Ole Opry just before she became a major star.  Roy Clark was part of the program and may have introduced her. She bounded on stage in an appropriate, lady-like bundle of energy manner.

Later, as an established star, but without the current chart-topping power of the peak of her career, she performed in the Hooper Eblen Coliseum at Tennessee Tech on a Sunday Afternoon. The audience didn’t begin to fill up the 10,000 seat Hooper Eblen Coliseum. I remember feeling a tinge of disappointment that the audience, though enthusiastic, wasn’t bigger.  

What might a Barbara Mandrell revival look like. There’s already a lot known about her career.  You can check out several  on line sites to see that Mandrell came into prominence with songs such as Sleeping Single in a Double Bed and I Was Country When Country Wasn’t Cool.

Since there is a lot known about Barbara Mandrell’s career, what would be left to focus on for a Barbara Mandrell revival, you say. Good question!  Here are some points that might be investigated by scholars and journalists. First of all, I’d like to know about her experiences as woman in Country Music, her perceptions as a young woman about the Country Music industry, and how have her views and memories of the Country Music industry changed throughout the years. Here are some specific questions that might be particularly interesting to explore in interviews or if there are some historical materials available. 

• What kinds of obstacles did Barbara Mandrell face as a woman that male Country Music artists didn’t face? 
• Did she experience subtle or direct sexual harassment from music executives, radio programmers, DJs, and studio musicians, and promoters? 
• What specific advice was she given by her father who managed much of her career? 
• What specific advice did she receive from established women Country Music artists?  
• Did she have a network of female Country Music artists who she depended upon for friendship and support? 
• How does she view the recent push by activists to achieve equality of air time for women on Country Music radio? 
• What did she know as a young and emerging artist about the history of Country Music and particularly the role of women in Country Music? 
• What did she think of TomatoGate with women seen as a side dressing to the main salad of Country Music radio…male artists?

There’s another aspect of a Barbara Mandrell revival that might/could use some investigation. Many of Mandrell’s major hits achieved cross-over status onto the pop charts and contributed to furthering a popular sound to Country Music. Yet, Barbara Mandrell served in the Association of Country Entertainers (ACE) that formed in response to Australian singer Olivia Newton-John receiving Female Entertainer of the year in 1974 over Loretta Lynn, Anne Murray, Dolly Parton, and Tanya Tucker.

The formation of ACE included many Grand Ole Opry artists. Minnie Pearl claimed, according to Roland Note, “This year’s female vocalist winner, Olivia Newton-John, said she was coming to Nashville to meet Hank Williams. She didn’t even know that he was dead.”

So….here are some additional questions that a Barbara Mandrell revival might investigate.

• What is your basic, major memory of the Association of Country Entertainers in 1974? 
• Did you feel as strongly about Olivia Newton-John’s Female Entertainer of the Year Award as did Minnie Pearl and other Opry members? 
• The Nashville Sound began about 1957 to have more pop oriented sounds. Could any organization ‘roll-back’ the sound of Country Music? 
• Did your own recordings also contribute to a pop-country sound? 
• Sleeping Single in a Double Bed is a great song, but didn’t it sound more pop than earlier Country Music? 
• Today’s Country Music doesn’t even sound like the 1970s Country Music. Is it really Country Music?  
• What has changed and stayed the same about Country Music, if anything? 
• What about the use of hip-hop and rap style in recent Country Music? 
• Is Bro Country worse about attitudes toward women than earlier songs about Snuff Queens?

There’s another dimension about a Barbara Mandrell revival that interests me. Dolly Parton, like Willie Nelson, has kept performing. Both are in the public eye with astonishing frequency. Both Dolly and Willie seem to have become cultural icons. A Barbara Mandrell revival might question if she could have become a cultural icon had she kept performing. 

Could she have found a variety of causes that could have helped build an iconic status as she kept performing and recording? Dolly’s Imagination Library, support for victims of the Gatlinburg region forest fires, positive statements about LGBTQ and African Americans, and giving for COVID research continually elevate her iconic status. 

Even Dolly’s appearance at the Newport Folk Festival with the very hip High women elevated her status. Willie’s causes such as Farm Aid, legalisation of marijuana , and Super Bowl commercial for Skechers all seem to have kept him in the public eye as well as a new album as he approaches his 89th birthday. 

Here are a few questions that might be interesting to ask.

• If you were to perform frequently again what would you change about your sound? 
• Would you want to update your sound to be like 2022 Country Music or would you keep it the same? 
• Would you want to be a nostalgia 70s and 80s Country Music Act? 
• Would you want to perform with the likes of Maren Morris, Brandy Clark, and Mickey Guyton? 
• Do you ever regret retiring from performing? 
• Does the increased visibility of Dolly Parton and Willie Nelson make you think that retiring might not have been the best option? 
• Both Dolly and Willie have had causes that seemed to increase their visibility. Are there any social causes that you deeply care about that might have an impact on your visibility? 
• What is your opinion on LBGTQ issues of sexual choice and racial issues that have flared up in recent years. How should the Country Music industry and Country Music radio specifically deal with these issues? 

I’m beginning to think that there could be some problems with a Barbara Mandrell revival. Maybe I better rethink if it’s even likely. More important, is it even a good idea.  Dolly and Willie have had lots of time to adapt as they continued to be active artists. 

It might be that a Barbara Mandrell revival could be more stressful than anticipated. If she came out occasionally from retirement the changed landscape of Country Music and the issues touching Country Music might be difficult to handle. 

Interviews with journalists and scholars might pose potential pitfalls, a minefield of sorts, if she’s not been keeping up in depth, learning new vocabulary words…gender fluidity, cis, transgender, and allyship to name a few…plus have an concerned and compassionate response to the murder of George Floyd and Black Lives Matter. 

All the gender words take time to master. All the discussions about race by groups such as #NashvilleMusicEquality take time to assimilate. 

I don’t think interviews as recent as 2017 for CountryStarsCentral, a 2021 interview on The Outdoorsman With Buck McNeely  or Terri Clark’s 2020 Country Gold Backstage podcast  would prepare Barbara Mandrell for the current environment.

I think I better back off this idea of a Barbara Mandrell revival. She added to my enjoyment and understanding of Country Music. She had a wonderful career. She was a wonderful artist. She contributed to the development of contemporary Country Music. That’s quite an impact. 

Yes. I think I’ll forgo this Barbara Mandrell revival notion. She can continue to enjoy her richly deserved retirement and time with her family.