【文章标题】：Dolly Parton Has Died
【文章正文】： Dolly Parton
| Dolly Parton | |
|---|---|
| Born | Dolly Rebecca Parton January 19, 1946 |
| Died | August 25, 2026 (aged 80) Nashville, Tennessee, U.S. |
| Occupations | |
| Years active | 1956–2026 |
| Spouse | Carl Dean (m. 1966; died 2025) |
| Relatives | |
| Awards | Full list |
| Musical career | |
| Genres | |
| Instruments | |
| Works | |
| Labels | |
| Website | dollyparton |
| Signature | |
| Dolly Rebecca Parton Dean[2][3] (née Parton; January 19, 1946 – August 25, 2026) was an American singer, songwriter, actress, philanthropist, and businesswoman. After achieving success as a songwriter for other artists, Parton’s debut album, Hello, I’m Dolly, was released in 1967, commencing a career spanning 60 years and 50 studio albums. Referred to as the “Queen of Country”, Parton was one of the most-honored female country performers in history and received various accolades, including 11 Grammy Awards and three Emmy Awards, as well as nominations for two Academy Awards including a humanitarian honorary Oscar win in 2025, six Golden Globe Awards, and a Tony Award. | |
| Parton sold more than 100 million records worldwide, making her one of the best-selling music artists ever.[4][5] Her music includes Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA)-certified gold, platinum and multi-platinum awards. She had 25 singles reach No. 1 on the Billboard country music charts, a record for a female artist (tied with Reba McEntire). She had 44 career Top 10 country albums, a record for any artist, and she had 110 career-charted singles over the past 40 years. Her 49th and final solo studio album, Rockstar (2023), became her highest-charting Billboard 200 album, peaking at number three. | |
| Parton composed over 3,000 songs, including “I Will Always Love You” (a two-time U.S. country chart-topper and an international hit for Whitney Houston and sold 40 million copies worldwide), “Jolene”, “Coat of Many Colors” and “9 to 5”. As an actress, she starred in the films 9 to 5 (1980) and The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas (1982), for each of which she earned Golden Globe nominations for Best Actress, as well as Rhinestone (1984), Steel Magnolias (1989), Straight Talk (1992), and Joyful Noise (2012). She died on August 25, 2026 in Nashville, Tennessee, at the age of 80.[6] | |
| Early life | |
| Dolly Rebecca Parton was born on January 19, 1946, in a one-room cabin[7] on the banks of the Little Pigeon River in Pittman Center, Tennessee.[8][9] She was the fourth of twelve children born to Avie Lee Caroline Parton (née Owens; 1923–2003) and Robert Lee Parton Sr. (1921–2000).[10] Her siblings were Willadeene (born 1940), David Wilburn (1942–2024),[11] Coy Denver (1943–2026),[12] Robert Lee “Bobby” (born 1948), Stella Mae (born 1949), Cassie Nan (born 1951), Randle Huston “Randy” (1953–2021),[13] Larry Gerald (1955–1955),[14] twins Frieda Estelle (born 1957) and Floyd Estel (1957–2018),[15] and Rachel Ann (born 1959).[16][17] Parton’s middle name came from her maternal great-great-grandmother Rebecca (née Dunn) Whitted.[18] | |
| Parton’s father, known as “Lee”, worked in the mountains of East Tennessee, first as a sharecropper and later tending his own small tobacco farm and acreage. He also worked construction jobs to supplement the farm’s small income. Despite her father’s illiteracy, Parton often said he was one of the smartest people she had ever known with regard to business and making a profit.[7][19][20] Parton’s mother cared for their large family. Her eleven pregnancies (the tenth being twins) in twenty years made her a mother of twelve by age thirty-five. Parton credited her musical abilities to her mother’s influence; often in poor health, she still managed to keep house and entertain her children with Smoky Mountain folklore and old ballads. With Welsh ancestry, Avie Lee knew many ballads that immigrants from the British Isles brought to southern Appalachia in the 18th and 19th century.[failed verification][21][22] Avie Lee’s father, Jake Owens, was a Pentecostal preacher, and Parton and her siblings attended church regularly. | |
| Parton long credited her father for her business sense and her mother’s family for her musical abilities. When she was a young girl, her family moved from the Pittman Center area to a two‑room cabin and farm on nearby Locust Ridge. Most of her cherished childhood memories happened there. A replica of the Locust Ridge cabin is displayed at her namesake theme park Dollywood.[23] The farm acreage and surrounding woodland inspired her to write the song “My Tennessee Mountain Home” in the 1970s. Years after the farm was sold, Parton bought it back in the late 1980s. Her brother Bobby helped with building restoration and new construction.[7] Parton said her family was “dirt poor”.[24] Her father paid missionary Dr. Robert F. Thomas with a sack of cornmeal for delivering her.[25] Later in life, Parton wrote a song about Dr. Thomas.[26] She also outlined her family’s poverty in her early songs “Coat of Many Colors” and “In the Good Old Days (When Times Were Bad)”. | |
| Parton and her family lived in their one-bedroom cabin on their small subsistence farm on Locust Ridge.[27] It was in a predominantly Pentecostal area located north of the Greenbrier Valley of the Great Smoky Mountains. Music played an important role in her early life. She was brought up in the Church of God (Cleveland, Tennessee),[28] in a congregation pastored by her grandfather, Jake Robert Owens. Her earliest public performances were in the church, beginning at age six. At seven, she started playing a homemade guitar. When she was eight, her uncle bought her first real guitar.[29][30] The Parton family was well-fed despite their poverty, and her 2024 cookbook, Good Lookin’ Cookin’ (co-written with her sister Rachel), recalls numerous family meals.[31] After graduating from Sevier County High School in Sevierville, Tennessee in 1964, Parton moved to Nashville the next day.[7][32] | |
| Music career | |
| 1956–1966: Early work and songwriting | |
| Parton began performing as a child,[33] singing on local radio and television programs in the East Tennessee area.[34] By 10, she was appearing on The Cas Walker Show on both WIVK Radio and WBIR-TV in Knoxville, Tennessee. At 13, she recorded the single “Puppy Love” on a small Louisiana label, Goldband Records,[32] and appeared at the Grand Ole Opry, where she first met Johnny Cash, who encouraged her to follow her own instincts regarding her career.[35] | |
| Parton’s initial success came as a songwriter, having signed with Combine Publishing shortly after her arrival.[36] Along with her frequent songwriting partner, uncle Bill Owens, she wrote several charting singles during this time, including two Top 10 hits for Bill Phillips: “Put It Off Until Tomorrow” and “The Company You Keep” (1966). She also wrote Skeeter Davis’s number 11 hit “Fuel to the Flame” (1967).[37] Her songs were recorded by many other artists during this period, including Kitty Wells and Hank Williams Jr.[38] At 19, She signed with Monument Records in 1965, where she was initially pitched as a bubblegum pop singer. She released a string of singles, but the only one that charted, “Happy, Happy Birthday Baby”, did not crack the Billboard Hot 100. Although she expressed a desire to record country material, Monument resisted, thinking her unusually high soprano voice was not suited to the genre.[39] | |
| After her uncredited composition of “Put It Off Until Tomorrow” with Bill Phillips went to number six on the country chart in 1966, the label relented and allowed her to record country. Her first country single, “Dumb Blonde”, composed by Curly Putman, reached number 24 on the country chart in 1967, followed by “Something Fishy”, which went to number 17. The two songs appeared on her first full-length album, Hello, I’m Dolly.[40] | |
| 1967–1975: Country music success | |
| In 1967, musician and country music entertainer Porter Wagoner invited Parton to join The Porter Wagoner Show, offering her a regular spot on his weekly syndicated television program and in his road show. As documented in her 1994 autobiography,[41] much of Wagoner’s audience was initially unhappy that Parton had replaced previous performer Norma Jean, who had left the show, sometimes chanting loudly for Norma Jean from the audience.[42] With Wagoner’s assistance however, Parton was eventually accepted. Wagoner convinced his label, RCA Victor, to sign her. RCA decided to protect their investment by releasing her first single as a duet with Wagoner. That song, a remake of Tom Paxton’s “The Last Thing on My Mind”, released in late 1967, reached the country Top 10 in January 1968, launching a six-year streak of virtually uninterrupted Top 10 singles for the pair.[citation needed] | |
| Parton’s first solo single for RCA Victor, “Just Because I’m a Woman”, was released in the summer of 1968 and was a moderate chart hit, reaching number 17.[citation needed] For the next two years, none of her solo efforts – even “In the Good Old Days (When Times Were Bad)”, which later became a standard – were as successful as her duets with Wagoner. The duo was named Vocal Group of the Year in 1968 by the Country Music Association,[citation needed] but Parton’s solo records were continually ignored. Wagoner had a significant financial stake in her future; as of 1969, he was her co-producer and owned nearly half of Owe-Par, the publishing company Parton had founded with Bill Owens.[43] | |
| By 1970, both Parton and Wagoner had grown frustrated by her lack of solo chart success. Wagoner persuaded Parton to record Jimmie Rodgers’ “Mule Skinner Blues”, a gimmick that worked. The record shot to number three,[citation needed] followed closely by her first number-one single, “Joshua” in February 1971.[citation needed] For the next two years, she had numerous solo hits in addition to her duets, including her signature song, “Coat of Many Colors” (number four, 1971). Further Top 20 singles included “The Right Combination” and “Burning the Midnight Oil” (both duets with Wagoner, 1971); “Lost Forever in Your Kiss” (with Wagoner), “Touch Your Woman” (1972), “My Tennessee Mountain Home” and “Travelin’ Man” (1973).[44] | |
| Although her solo singles and the Wagoner duets were successful, her biggest hit of this period was “Jolene”. Released in late 1973, the song topped the country chart in February 1974 and reached the lower regions of the Hot 100.[citation needed] It also eventually charted in the U.K., reaching number seven in 1976, representing Parton’s first U.K. success. Parton, who had always envisioned a solo career, made the decision to leave Wagoner’s show and she stopped appearing in mid-1974. The pair performed their last duet concert in April 1974, although they remained affiliated, with Wagoner helping to produce her records through 1975.[41] Their final release as a duo was 1975’s Say Forever You’ll Be Mine.[44] | |
| In 1974, Parton’s song, “I Will Always Love You”, written about her professional break from Wagoner, went to number one on the country chart. Around the same time, Elvis Presley indicated that he wanted to record the song. Parton was interested until Presley’s manager, Colonel Tom Parker, told her that it was standard procedure for the songwriter to sign over half of the publishing rights to any song recorded by Presley.[45] Parton refused. That decision has been credited with helping to make her many millions of dollars in royalties from the song over the years. Parton had three solo singles reach number one on the country chart in 1974 (“Jolene”, “I Will Always Love You” and “Love Is Like a Butterfly”), as well as the duet with Porter Wagoner, “Please Don’t Stop Loving Me”. Parton again topped the singles chart in 1975 with “The Bargain Store”.[46] In a 2019 episode of the Sky Arts music series Brian Johnson: A Life on the Road, Parton described finding old cassette tapes later on in her career and discovered that she had composed both “Jolene” and “I Will Always Love You” in the same songwriting session. As she told Johnson, “Buddy, that was a good night!”[citation needed] | |
| 1976–1986: A broader audience | |
| Between 1974 and 1980, Parton had a series of country hits, with eight singles reaching number one. Her influence on pop culture is reflected by the many performers covering her songs, including mainstream and crossover artists such as Olivia Newton-John, Emmylou Harris and Linda Ronstadt.[41] | |
| Parton began to embark on a high-profile crossover campaign, attempting to aim her music in a more mainstream direction and increase her visibility outside of the confines of country music. In 1976, she began working closely with Sandy Gallin, who served as her personal manager for the next 25 years.[citation needed] With her 1976 album All I Can Do, which she co-produced with Porter Wagoner, Parton began taking more of an active role in production and began specifically aiming her music in a more mainstream, pop direction. Her first entirely self-produced effort, New Harvest…First Gathering (1977), highlighted her pop sensibilities, both in terms of choice of songs and production: the album contained covers of the pop and R&B classics “My Girl” and “Higher and Higher”.[47] Though the album was well received and topped the U.S. country albums chart, neither it nor its single “Light of a Clear Blue Morning” made much of an impression on the pop charts.[citation needed] | |
| After New Harvest’s disappointing crossover performance, Parton turned to high-profile pop producer Gary Klein for her next album. The result, 1977’s Here You Come Again, became her first million-seller, topping the country album chart and reaching number 20 on the pop chart. The Barry Mann-Cynthia Weil-penned title track topped the country singles chart and became Parton’s first Top 10 single on the pop chart (no. 3). A second single, the double A-sided “Two Doors Down”/“It’s All Wrong, But It’s All Right” topped the country chart and crossed over to the pop Top 20. For the remainder of the 1970s and into the early 1980s, many of her subsequent singles moved up on both charts simultaneously. Her albums during this period were developed specifically for pop-crossover success.[48] | |
| In 1978, Parton won a Grammy Award for Best Female Country Vocal Performance for her Here You Come Again album.[citation needed] She continued to have hits with “Heartbreaker” (1978), “Baby I’m Burning” (1979) and “You’re the Only One” (1979), all of which charted in the pop Top 40 and topped the country chart. “Sweet Summer Lovin’” (1979) became the first Parton single in two years to not top the country chart, although it did reach the Top 10. During this period, her visibility continued to increase with multiple television appearances. A highly publicized candid interview on a Barbara Walters Special in 1977, timed to coincide with Here You Come Again’s release, was followed by appearances in 1978 on Cher’s ABC television special and her own joint special with Carol Burnett on CBS, Dolly & Carol in Nashville.[citation needed] | |
| Parton served as one of three co-hosts (along with Roy Clark and Glen Campbell) on the CBS special Fifty Years of Country Music.[citation needed] In 1979, Parton hosted the NBC special The Seventies: An Explosion of Country Music at Ford’s Theatre in Washington, D.C., a performance attended by President Jimmy Carter.[citation needed] Her commercial success grew in 1980, with three consecutive country chart number-one hits: the Donna Summer-written “Starting Over Again”, “Old Flames Can’t Hold a Candle to You” and “9 to 5”, which topped the country and pop charts in early 1981.[41] She had another Top 10 single that year with “Making Plans” from the 1980 album with Porter Wagoner,[49] released as part of a lawsuit settlement between the pair. | |
| The theme song to the 1980 feature film 9 to 5, in which she starred with Jane Fonda and Lily Tomlin, not only reached number one on the country chart, but also on the pop and the adult-contemporary charts in February 1981, giving her a triple number-one hit.[citation needed] Parton became one of the few female country singers to have a number-one single on the country and pop charts simultaneously. It also received a nomination for an Academy Award for Best Original Song. Her singles continued to appear consistently in the country Top 10. Between 1981 and 1985, she had twelve Top 10 hits, with half of them hitting number one. She continued to make inroads on the pop charts as well. A re-recorded version of “I Will Always Love You”, from the feature film The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas (1982) scraped the Top 50 that year and her duet with Kenny Rogers, “Islands in the Stream” (written by the Bee Gees and produced by Barry Gibb), spent two weeks at number one in 1983.[41] | |
| In the mid-1980s, her record sales were still relatively strong, with songs like “Save the Last Dance for Me”, “Tennessee Homesick Blues”, “God Won’t Get You” (1984), “Real Love” (another duet with Kenny Rogers), “Don’t Call It Love” (1985) and “Think About Love” (1986) all reaching the country Top 10. “Tennessee Homesick Blues”, “Think About Love” and “Real Love” reached number one on the country chart and became modest crossover hits. Despite this success, RCA Records did not renew her contract after it expired in 1986 and she signed with Columbia Records in 1987.[41] | |
| 1987–2005: Country and bluegrass period | |
| Along with Emmylou Harris and Linda Ronstadt, Parton released Trio (1987) to critical acclaim. The album revitalized Parton’s music career, spending five weeks at number one on Billboard’s Country Albums chart and also reached the Top 10 on Billboard’s Top 200 Albums chart. It sold several million copies and produced four Top 10 country hits, including Phil Spector’s “To Know Him Is to Love Him”, which went to number one. Trio won the Grammy Award for Best Country Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal and was nominated for a Grammy Award for Album of the Year. After a further attempt at pop success with the album Rainbow (1987), which included the single “The River Unbroken”, it was not well-received commercially, causing Parton to focus on recording country material. White Limozeen (1989) produced two number one hits in “Why’d You Come in Here Lookin’ Like That” and “Yellow Roses”. Although Parton’s career appeared to be revived, it was actually just a brief revival before contemporary country music came in the early 1990s and moved most veteran artists off the charts.[41] | |
| A duet with Ricky Van Shelton, “Rockin’ Years” (1991) reached number one, though Parton’s greatest commercial fortune of the decade came when Whitney Houston recorded “I Will Always Love You” for the soundtrack of the feature film The Bodyguard (1992). Both the single and the album were massively successful. Parton’s soundtrack album from the 1992 film, Straight Talk, however, was less successful. But her 1993 album Slow Dancing with the Moon won critical acclaim and did well on the charts, reaching number four on the country albums chart and number 16 on the Billboard 200 album chart. It would also become Platinum certified.[50][51] She recorded “The Day I Fall in Love” as a duet with James Ingram for the feature film Beethoven’s 2nd (1993). The songwriters Ingram, Carole Bayer Sager and Clif Magness were nominated for an Academy Award for Best Original Song and Parton and Ingram performed the song at the awards telecast. Similar to her earlier collaborative album with Emmy-Lou Harris and Linda Ronstadt, Parton released Honky Tonk Angels in the fall of 1993 with Loretta Lynn and Tammy Wynette.[52] It was certified as a gold album by the Recording Industry Association of America and helped revive both Wynette and Lynn’s careers. Also in 1994, Parton contributed the song “You Gotta Be My Baby” to the AIDS benefit album Red Hot + Country produced by the Red Hot Organization.[53] A live acoustic album, Heartsongs: Live from Home, featuring stripped-down versions of some of her hits, as well as some traditional songs, was released in late 1994.[54] | |
| Parton’s recorded music during the mid-to-late 1990s remained steady and somewhat eclectic. Her 1995 re-recording of “I Will Always Love You”, performed as a duet with Vince Gill from her album Something Special, won the Country Music Association’s Vocal Event of the Year Award. The following year, Treasures, an album of covers of 1960s/70s hits was released and featured a diverse collection of material, including songs by Mac Davis, Pete Seeger, Kris Kristofferson, Cat Stevens and Neil Young. Her recording of Stevens’ “Peace Train” was later re-mixed and released as a dance single, reaching Billboard’s dance singles chart. Her 1998 country-rock album Hungry Again was made up entirely of her own compositions. Although neither of the album’s two singles, “(Why Don’t More Women Sing) Honky Tonk Songs” and “Salt in my Tears”, charted, videos for both songs received significant airplay on CMT. A second and more contemporary collaboration with Harris and Ronstadt, Trio II, was released in early 1999. Its cover of Neil Young’s song “After the Gold Rush” won a Grammy Award for Best Country Collaboration with Vocals. Parton also was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1999.[52] | |
| Parton recorded a series of bluegrass-inspired albums, beginning with The Grass Is Blue (1999), winning a Grammy Award for Best Bluegrass Album; and Little Sparrow (2001), with its cover of Collective Soul’s “Shine” winning a Grammy Award for Best Female Country Vocal Performance. The third, Halos & Horns (2002) included a bluegrass version of the Led Zeppelin song “Stairway to Heaven”. In 2005, she released Those Were The Days consisting of her interpretations of hits from the folk-rock era of the late 1960s and early 1970s, including “Imagine”, “Where Do the Children Play?”, “Crimson and Clover” and “Where Have All the Flowers Gone?”[52] | |
| 2005–2020: Touring and holiday album | |
| Parton earned her second Academy Award nomination for Best Original Song for “Travelin’ Thru”, which she wrote specifically for the feature film Transamerica (2005).[55] Due to the song’s (and film’s) acceptance of a transgender woman, Parton received death threats.[56] She returned to number one on the country chart later in 2005 by lending her distinctive harmonies to the Brad Paisley ballad, “When I Get Where I’m Going”.[52] In September 2007, Parton released her first single from her own record company, Dolly Records, titled, “Better Get to Livin’”, which eventually peaked at number 48 on Billboard’s Hot Country Songs chart. It was followed by the studio album Backwoods Barbie, which was released on February 26, 2008, and reached number two on the country chart. The album’s debut at number 17 on the all-genre Billboard 200 albums chart was the highest in her career.[57] Backwoods Barbie produced four additional singles, including the title track, written as part of her score for 9 to 5: The Musical, an adaptation of her feature film. After the death of Michael Jackson, whom Parton knew personally, she released a video in which she sombrely told of her feelings on Jackson and his death.[58][59] | |
| On October 27, 2009, Parton released a four-CD box set, Dolly, which featured 99 songs, spanning most of her career.[60] She released her second live DVD and album, Live From London in October 2009, filmed during her sold-out 2008 concerts at London’s The O2 Arena. On August 10, 2010, with longtime friend Billy Ray Cyrus, Parton released the album Brother Clyde. Parton is featured on “The Right Time”, which she co-wrote with Cyrus and Morris Joseph Tancredi. On January 6, 2011, Parton announced that her new album would be titled Better Day. In February 2011, she announced that she would embark on the Better Day World Tour on July 17, 2011, with shows in northern Europe and the U.S.[61] The album’s lead-off single, “Together You and I”, was released on May 23, 2011, and Better Day was released on June 28, 2011.[62] In 2011, Parton voiced the character Dolly Gnome in the animated film Gnomeo & Juliet. On February 11, 2012, after the sudden death of Whitney Houston, Parton stated, “Mine is only one of the millions of hearts broken over the death of Whitney Houston. I will always be grateful and in awe of the wonderful performance she did on my song and I can truly say from the bottom of my heart, ‘Whitney, I will always love you. You will be missed.’”[63] | |
| In 2013, Parton joined Lulu Roman for a re-recording of “I Will Always Love You” for Roman’s album, At Last.[64] In 2013, Parton and Kenny Rogers reunited for the title song of his album You Can’t Make Old Friends. For their performance, they were nominated at the 2014 Grammy Awards for Grammy Award for Best Country Duo/Group Performance.[65] In 2014, Parton embarked on the Blue Smoke World Tour in support of her 42nd studio album, Blue Smoke.[66] The album was first released in Australia and New Zealand on January 31 to coinci |