Introduction Welcome to “The Greatest Hits Explained”. My name is Michael Winter and I’m the host and editor of the show. I’m a German American passionate music lover and I would now like to invite you to go on an exciting musical journey with me. If you’re in the mood for some entertaining pop music history, you’ve come to the right place. I’m glad you’re here and I’m really looking forward to this journey together. Today, we’re gonna talk about a wonderful song that was written by legendary American singer-song- writer Dolly Parton and originally released by her in 1974. While the song was quite a success at the time, reaching the number one spot of the “Billboard Hot Country Songs Chart” in 1974 and again in 1982 after Dolly re-recorded and re-released it, it was not until 1992, when American R&B singer Whitney Houston recorded and released a new version of the song for the soundtrack of the movie “The Bodyguard”, that the song became one of the most successful songs of all time. Yes, you guessed right: I’m talking about the song “I Will Always Love You” – one of the best-selling singles of all time.1 Since the song “I Will Always Love You” is copyrighted material and purchasing the rights would be awfully expensive, I’m not able to play it here for you. But don’t worry, I’m gonna tell you everything about the song you need to know and then you can listen to it elsewhere after you finished this episode here. If you like this show, please subscribe, leave a review, a like, a comment – whatever applies to the specific platform on which you’re listening to this. Also, I really appreciate donations. Those donations help me cover my expenses for this show such as hosting fees, equipment cost, etc. I’m doing all of this to entertain you based on my endless love for music and since there is no big network pumping dollars into this show, I’m the one who has to pay for all related expenses. Therefore, a small donation would already be amazing. Also, maybe you want to drop me a note from one music lover to another – I hope to hear from all of you. It’s now time to travel back into time and, since the focus of this episode is on the 1992 version of “I Will Always Love You” which was the number one US Billboard Hot 100 song of the year 1993, we’re first gonna go through some of the important events of the year 1993 before we’re gonna focus on the music by discussing the song, its production, success and reception.1 After that, we’ll get to know the artists and musicians behind it, Dolly Parton and Whitney Houston, among others, a lot better and we’ll also explore more of the musical aspects related to “I Will Always Love You” including its lyrics. The grand finale will then be a quick exploration of the song’s legacy. By the way, please note that you can find a link to the sources I used for this show in the show description. Also, I’m mentioning all the sources I used at the very end of this show. This show is based on my personal research of sources I found online and otherwise. Therefore, I owe a lot of thanks to the authors of these original sources. I have used both paraphrased and literal content and quotes from these sources without declaring them during the show as it would have taken away from the flow. In no way was this intended to claim that I came up with all the original content. I see my job as putting together and processing the content from a variety of different sources in a way that it creates a new and exciting narrative that wouldn’t necessarily be possible and available using the single sources alone in an unprocessed way. And if there’s anything that I stated or pronounced incorrectly, please forgive me. I did my best. 1 Source 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Will_Always_Love_You The Times Whitney Houston’s version of “I Will Always Love You” was the US Billboard Hot 100 song of the year 1993 and, therefore, we’re gonna take a look at the year 1993 before focusing on the song and the people behind it.1 Shining a light on the situation the world was in when the song was successful provides us with some helpful context. 1993 was the 993rd year of the 2nd millennium, the 93rd year of the 20th century and the 4th year of the 1990s decade.2 Here’s a quick but not exhaustive list of what happened in 1993: The year started with Czechoslovakia ceasing to exist on January 1st when the Czech Republic and Slovakia separated in what was called the Velvet Divorce.2 US President George Bush and Russian President Boris Yeltsin signed the second Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty in Moscow on January 3rd.2 On January 20th, Bill Clinton was sworn in as the 42nd President of the United States.2 And on January 26th, Václav Havel was elected President of the Czech Republic.2 On February 26th, the World Trade Center in New York City was bombed killing six and injuring over one thousand people.2 April 19th: A stand-off at a compound of religious sect The Branch Davidians near Waco, Texas, ends after 51 days with a fire that kills 76 people, including the cult leader David Koresh.2 Tennis player Monica Seles – at the time the world’s number one in women's tennis – was stabbed during a match in Hamburg on April 30th.2 The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia was created in The Hague on May 25th. On June 9th, the movie Jurassic Park was released.2 Windows NT 3.1, the first version of Microsoft's line of Windows NT operating systems, was released to manufacturing on July 27th.2 On October 3rd, the Battle of Mogadishu which consisted of the U.S. Army conducting Operation Gothic Serpent in the city of Mogadishu, Somalia took place. Over 1,000 Somalians died, over 73 Americans were wounded in action, 18 were killed and 1 was captured.2 1 Source 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Will_Always_Love_You 2 Source 2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1993 The Maastricht Treaty took effect on November 1st, formally establishing the European Union or, short, EU.24 3 And here are a couple of birthdays of famous people: January 11th: Michael Keane, an English soccer player.2 February 6th: Tinashe, an American actress and singer.2 March 4th: Bobbi Kristina Brown, daughter of Whitney Houston who’s the focus of this episode, and an American media personality and singer – she died in 2015.2 April 16th: Chance the Rapper, an American rapper.2 May 9th: Ryosuke Yamada, a Japanese singer and actor.2 June 26th: Ariana Grande, an American singer, songwriter, and actress.2 July 28th: Cher Lloyd, an English singer.2 August 29th: Liam Payne, a British singer-songwriter.2 September 12th: Kelsea Ballerini, an American singer.2 October 9th: Scotty McCreery, an American singer.2 November 30th: Yuri Chinen, a Japanese singer and actor.2 December 22nd: Meghan Trainor, an American singer-songwriter, musician and producer.2 Next up, the deaths of a number of famous people: January 6th: Dizzy Gillespie, an American jazz musician born in 1917 and Rudolf Nureyev, a Russian dancer born in 1938.2 January 20th: Audrey Hepburn, a Belgian-born British actress born in 1929.2 February 20th: Ferruccio Lamborghini, an Italian automobile manufacturer born in 1916.2 February 24th: Bobby Moore, an English soccer player born in 1941.2 February 25th: Eddie Constantine, an American-born French actor and singer born in 1917.2 2 Source 2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1993 March 31st: Brandon Lee, an American actor and son of Bruce Lee born in 1965.2 June 5th: Conway Twitty, an American musician born in 1933.2 August 16th: Stewart Granger, an Anglo-American actor born in 1913.2 September 12th: Raymond Burr, a Canadian American actor born in 1917.2 October 25th: Vincent Price, an American actor born in 1911.2 October 31st: Federico Fellini, an Italian film director born in 1920 and River Phoenix, an American actor born in 1970.2 December 2nd: Pablo Escobar, a Colombian drug lord born in 1949.2 December 4th: Frank Zappa, an American singer, guitarist and composer born in 1940.2 Other than that, 1993 was the year that Nelson Mandela received the Nobel Peace Prize and Toni Morrison won the same prize in category Literature to name two Nobel prize winners in that year. On the fashion side of things, very popular were Doc Martens boots, skin-tight dresses like Sharon Stone wore it in the movie Basic Instinct, bodysuits, the so-called mom jeans that were worn not only by moms but also by a lot of young people, overalls, Carhartt jackets and plaid flannel shirts to only name a few trends.34 People born in 1993 belong to the Millennials generation, also known as Generation Y, which defines the demographic cohort of people born between around 1981 and 1996.4 A gentleman named Karol Józef Wojtyła – better known as Pope John Paul II – was the head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State.5 François Mitterrand was the President of France, Helmut Kohl was the Chancellor of Germany, Oscar Luigi Scalfaro was the President of Italy, John Major was the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Bill Clinton, was the President of the United States from January on, Akihito was the Emperor of Japan and Canada had even three Prime Ministers in one year: Brian Mulroney, Kim Campbell and Jean Chrétien.6 2 Source 2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1993 3 Source 3: https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/52657/11-fashions-kids-were-wearing-back-1993 4 Source 4: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millennials 5 Source 5: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_John_Paul_II 6 Source 6: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_state_leaders_in_1993 The year also saw the 1993 Storm of the Century which was a large cyclonic storm that formed over the Gulf of Mexico on March 12th and then moved through the Gulf of Mexico, the eastern United States and eastern Canada before dissipating in the North Atlantic Ocean on March 15th.