Why Tammy Wynette Matters -- Steacy Easton, Hardcover

How Tammy Wynette channeled the conflicts of her life into her music and performance.

With hits such as "Stand By Your Man" and "Golden Ring," Tammy Wynette was an icon of American domesticity and femininity. But there were other sides to the first lady of country. Steacy Easton places the complications of Wynette's music and her biography in sharp-edged relief, exploring how she made her sometimes-tumultuous life into her work, a transformation that was itself art.

Wynette created a persona of high femininity to match the themes she sang about--fawning devotion, redemption in heterosexual romance, the heartbreak of loneliness. Behind the scenes, her life was marked by persistent class anxieties; despite wealth and fame, she kept her beautician's license. Easton argues that the struggle to meet expectations of southernness, womanhood, and southern womanhood, finds subtle expression in Wynette's performance of "Apartment #9"--and it's because of these vocal subtleties that it came to be called the saddest song ever written. Wynette similarly took on elements of camp and political critique in her artistry, demonstrating an underappreciated genius. Why Tammy Wynette Matters reveals a musician who doubled back on herself, her façade of earnestness cracked by a melodrama that weaponized femininity and upended feminist expectations, while scoring twenty number-one hits.

Author: Steacy Easton
Publisher: University of Texas Press
Published: 05/09/2023
Pages: 184
Binding Type: Hardcover
Weight: 0.73lbs
Size: 8.25h x 5.33w x 0.82d
ISBN: 9781477324646

Review Citation(s):
Library Journal 05/01/2023 pg. 90

About the Author

Steacy Easton has written about country music for NPR, Slate, and the Atlantic. They are a PhD student in critical disability studies at York University.