Roy Pauley vs. The World

Singing News introduced a new column in their June issue that has the potential to attract readers. It's a column that promises to contradict Roy Pauley each month. Writers will be rotated.

The first entry fell flat, though. Pauley starts off saying his opinion in the June issue isn't shared by the magazine publisher, and bellyaches that this is "always the case." Then he launches into an attack where virtually all the industry agrees improvement needs to be made: SG radio. Pauley's column boils down to an argument that DJs should always be on the lookout for quality, seeking it out if it doesn't come to them, and not automatically play groups when they're on a major label if the quality is lacking. Where's the controversy in that?

The contrasting opinion comes from Ed Leonard, president of Daywind. The height of his difference in opinion comes when he says "major labels believe that independent artists and labels hold too much sway at radio." That's only natural for the head of a major label. Leonard goes on to agree that if the quality is there, then regardless of the source, the music should be played...precisely what Pauley said. Again I ask, where's the beef?

I think the bulk of the controversy is really a misunderstanding. Leonard assumed Pauley was saying independents currently aren't being played, which isn't the case. Pauley said artists with quality aren't being played. Pointing to the charts to prove independents get played is ignoring the point.

What both of them stopped short of saying is that most Southern Gospel DJs aren't adequately trained enough to recognize quality when they hear it. Pauley and Leonard both appear to assume that everyone in the radio industry knows the difference between good quality and bad. In my opinion, the majority of Southern Gospel DJs wouldn't recognize good quality if it slapped them over the head. Once in a while, they do play a good song, but you all know the modern proverb about blind squirrels.

Of course, there will be differences in style, diction standards, and personal preferences when it comes to music. However, a line should be drawn when it comes to singing out of tune, unoriginal lyrics, with an accompaniment that sounds like it was recorded with 1950s technology. Sadly, I hear that sort of music just about every time I listen to a Southern Gospel station. It's too bad that neither Pauley nor Leonard pointed that out.

Southern Gospel, for all it's advances in production quality and artist development over the past fifteen years, will always be at a disadvantage compared to other genres until there comes a day when we can get clueless DJs from behind the wheel of the bus. Fortunately, there are some stations out there that are doing a great job, but there's still a lot to be desired in Southern Gospel radio.