Whitney Houston’s I Will Always Love You is a timeless classic. It is recognized as one of the most beautiful love ballads of all time, fourteen weeks as number one on the Billboard Hot 100 List. While everyone knows the song, and most people know the movie that popularized it, very few people know that it is a cover. I Will Always Love You was a song written by Dolly Parton and released almost 20 years before Whitney Houston covered it for her film, The Body Guard. Dolly Parton’s version of the song is different. Her song is almost two minutes shorter, and it’s a country song, it is just barely slower and it is lighter on the instruments. Whitney Houston’s cover is over four minutes long, and there is more soul and R&B, and it adds amazing instruments, like the saxophone (who’s solo literally gives me shivers). It is remarkable feat, what Whitney Houston accomplished, cover songs usually pale in comparison to their originals. Whitney Houston’s version of I Will Always Love you, however, is objectively better than Dolly Parton’s version. Houston has a stronger voice and a wider vocal range and the message of the benefits from being told through the genres of soul and R&B. Houston’s version is not just a cover, but a total reimagining, something “Take Me On: The Art of the Cover Song,” recognizes as a way to make “a great cover song.” Whitney Houston’s I Will Always Love You, is arguably the music industry’s best cover song, proven by the fact that most people do not realize that it is a cover song.
