36 June 1982 Marxism Today

DIANA ROSSRichard Dyer

More and more, Diana Ross's concerts andalbums are not a showcase for singing.There is plenty of performance, plenty ofproduction, she is still good value — butsinging is only one of the ingredients, andnot necessarily the most impressive. Con-certs and albums — she seems to have aban-doned her film career — are now ecstaticcelebrations of the myth and magic of DianaRoss.

Her voice of course is still at the heart ofthings. The qualities of the voice are bothwhat made her a star, gave her that particu-lar quality that caught on, and what madeher a 'cross-over' figure, appealing equallyto black and white audiences. It combinesopposite vocal textures that are also the dif-ferent textures of the traditions of black andwhite popular song. It has the fragile, cut-glass sweetness of soprano singers likeDeanna Durbin or Moira Anderson, but alsothe funkiness of other Motown singers,Mary Wells or Gladys Knight. It has thevocal 'purity' of white song, but is also

capable of all the 'dirty' notes as well, all thenotes which the straitjacket of the wholetonal system has outlawed as flirty. Being acombination of textures, a cross-over sound,she doesn't exploit these vocal traditions tothe full. She never has the coloratura preci-sion and brilliance of the sopranos, anddoesn't explore the expressive range of bluesand soul — she never rasps and growls likeMillie Jackson, never takes Billie Holliday'srhythmic risks, never evokes the gospel ofAretha Franklin. But her voice has otherqualities that also fix her star image.

It is an almost unreal voice. The openingof Remember Me — 'My baby, see youaround' — is ethereal, coming fromnowhere, the echo chamber enhancing justthat funky purity I've tried to describe. Youcan't quite believe anyone could sing likethat. Donna Summer's early albums mayhave something of it, but cruder, moreobviously sexual. The unreality of the voiceis part of the magic of the act, one that isalways reinforced by production. Thealbum covers nearly always use soft focus,deliberate blurring, often with colouredsmoke to enhance the effect; she is not pho-

tographed in any kind of concrete space, letalone any particular place; the clothes are inno way the clothes anyone would wear aboutthe place. The shows often start with a seriesof such albums cover images of her flashedup on a curtain; one of these freezes, andRoss walks out of it in the same costume as inthe photograph. With her voice, her wholeact is unreal, a fantasy.

The other important quality of the voice isits 'femininity'. I don't mean femaleness —there is nothing intrinsically female about ahigh, delicate, but funky voice; but sex rolesinsist that there is something feminine abouta vocal style that involves a range of devicessuch as: wordless cooing (the opening ofBaby Love), kittenish yelps (the climax ofAin't No Mountain High Enough), suppli-cant whispers (the bridge passages of TouchMe in the Morning), fragile screams of delight(throughout the concerts). And it is thesefeminine, and basically non-singing, qual-ities that have become so important as hercareer has developed.

The concerts, in particular, often haverather little in the way of sustained singing.What we get are endless reminders of pasthits, snatches of Where Did Our Love go?,I'm Still Waiting, Inside Out, which evokedifferent moments in her career, but whichare not fully sung through or reworkedmusically. Like the albums, much of themusical element is Diana cooing and yelpingto consummately orchestrated disco. Hervoice is often swallowed up in the stringsand saxes, and then also in the fabulouscostume changes and overwhelming light-ing effects. Those bits of songs, thosereminders of Diana Ross as a Supreme,Diana Ross in Lady Sings the Blues, DianaRoss as 'The Boss', are all swept up in ageneralised celebration of Ross, star.

But then just what is Diana Ross, what isbeing celebrated? Above all, she is a success.She is the only female black star whose namecan be mentioned in the same breath asFrank Sinatra or Barbra Streisand — whosealbums are always top best sellers, who isconsidered a big enough star to play at thetop night clubs in Las Vegas and AtlanticCity, who is, in other words, a one-hundred-per-cent certifiable star, with all the guaran-teed profitability that implies. Billie Hol-liday, Ella Fitzgerald, Lena Home, DonnaSummer — none have quite made it so unar-guably (whatever dispute there may beabout their relative talents). Diana Ross isthe epitome of something more character-istic of progressive directions in the USAthan in Europe. She has been carried alongon a tide of black and feminist agitation andunrest that has not wanted to change society

but to buy into, on fully equal terms, thegoodies that white, male society alreadyenjoys. Success has always been presented asone of the mainstream American goals of life— but the successful were not just any oldAmericans, but white male Americans. Butjust because success was presented as a gen-eral human goal, other — black, female —people could demand that they be a part ofit. Diana Ross is one of the most spectacularexamples of someone who has been allowedto be a success, and not just in the margina-lised spaces always permitted black artistes— the obscurity of jazz ('the devil's music'),the supporting, servant roles in films, thechorus parts and speciality acts inserted intoshows — but in the real mainstream ofAmerican popular entertainment.

At one level, we (Europeans) under-estimate the force and importance of thisform of social change. We fail to see thedegree to which the USA is a more opensociety than any Western European coun-try, that black people and women can get onto an extent unimaginable over here. And if,with our excellent political hats on, our mis-givings are based on our realising that suchsuccesses are still founded upon a systemthat must perpetuate inequality and oppres-sion, I also detect a certain world-weary dis-taste for material pleasure, for commerce,for the paltriness of glamour and glitter,feelings that we inherit from an essentiallyaristocratic sensibility.

But of course we are right to be uneasy.Recent surveys show that the situation ofblack people as a whole in the USA has gotworse in the past ten years, not better,despite some spectacular cosmetic jobs ofpromotion. Ross epitomises a success that isstill out of reach of most black people orwomen (or indeed of working class whitemen). But isn't that part of her act, too?

The sheer ecstasy of the whole Diana Rossthing is an outrageous revelling in what suc-cess could feel like, but not how to achieve it.The sexual imagery of the songs is often thatof 'surrender' (evoked equally for men andwomen), and that is also what the experienceof success is in the Ross shows — givingyourself up to the intoxication of worldlyacclaim, of sensuous delight, of luxuriatingpassivity. These are real material pleasures,there is nothing wrong or strange in wantingthem, but aren't they so excessively realisedin the Diana Ross show that you can'tbelieve in them as other than a gorgeousfantasy? The unreality of the voice, theinsubstantial shimmer of the costumes, thefantastic orchestration — did anyone everbelieve this was anything but a dream of howlife could be more beautiful, not how it

Marxism Today June 1982 37

really was?One of the high points in the show is the

Reach Out and Touch number. Diana goesinto the audience and clasps hands withthem, and then gets them all holding handswith whoever they are sitting next to, as shespeaks, sings, coos, 'Reach out and touch,somebody's hand, Make this world a betterplace, If you can.' Surely no-one everbelieved that's all you had to do, or thatDiana was really going to lead us into abetter world. But for a moment the ecstacyof success is linked to the joy of community,of feeling yourself part of a huge group ofpeople bent on goodwill. We get to expe-

rience what a good feeling that is, even whenwe know we are only in the theatre expe-riencing it fleetingly.

I don't say listening to Diana Ross andreaching, out and touching at her showswould make anyone join a movement tochange the world; but at least it vividlyexpresses the pleasures of a better world.That goes along with the competitiveness ofthe success motif and the passivity of thefemininity motif — no pleasures in thisworld are ideologically unalloyed. But withDiana, why not enjoy the best and forget therest? There's nothing else quite like heraround. •