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“After you reach a certain age, they think you’re over. Well, I will never be over,” Dolly Parton once declared. “I’ll be making records if I have to sell them out of the trunk of my car. I’ve done that in my past, and I’d do it again.”
Just as proficient with the razor-sharp quip as a timeless song, the inimitable country queen has thankfully never needed to rely on such primitive distribution methods. In fact, more than 60 years after Parton first entered the recording studio, the self-proclaimed Backwoods Barbie is shifting more units than ever before: 2023’s Rockstar achieved both her highest first-week sales (128,000) and position on the Billboard 200 (No. 3) of her career.
That only boosted Parton’s already remarkable worldwide record sales total of over 100 million, and took her tally of Top 10 country albums to 49. Throw in the record-matching 25 No. 1s on Billboards Hot Country Songs chart, three billion streams, and 11 GRAMMY Awards from 54 nominations, and it’s clear why she’ll forever be known as the Queen of Nashville.
Of course, Parton has had her commercial ups and downs over the years. But the quality of her music has always remained impeccably high, whether the traditional country of her late ’60s beginnings, the crossover pop of her early ’80s imperial phase, or the eclectic forays into bluegrass, gospel, and good old-fashioned rock ‘n’ roll that has made her 21st century discography so wonderfully unpredictable.
Further dispelling the title of her first hit “Dumb Blonde,” the bulk of Parton’s 50 studio efforts have been self-penned or self-produced, sometimes both. Indeed, “Coat of Many Colors,” “Jolene,” “I Will Always Love You,” “9 to 5,” and her countless other additions to the Great American Songbook have come from her prolific pen (she’s reportedly composed a colossal 3,000 tunes). Yet, as proven by chart-topping renditions of “Heartbreaker,” “Old Flames Can’t Hold A Candle to You,” and “But You Know I Love You,” along with covers albums Those Were the Days and Treasures, Parton is just as gifted a song interpreter as she is songwriter.
The legendary singer added yet another album to her discography on Nov. 15, this time recruiting her loved ones for Dolly Parton & Family: Smoky Mountain DNA – Family, Faith and Fables. In celebration of Parton’s latest LP, look back at the many phases of her career that have helped make her an enduring icon.
The Country Starlet
Having written hits for the likes of Bill Phillips and Skeeter Davis in her teens, the prodigious Dolly Parton became a chart star in her own right when her 1967 debut album, Hello, I’m Dolly, reached the Top 20 of Billboard’s US Top Country Albums chart. Remarkably, her first label, Monument, had initially been hesitant in allowing her to pursue the Nashville sound that would quickly become her forte. Loyal viewers of “The Porter Wagoner Show” were equally skeptical when she replaced favorite Norma Jean on the weekly country show.
However, Parton soon won over audiences with her natural charm, distinctive vibrato, and ability to tell a story in the most engaging, tuneful way possible. Over the next eight years, she continually flitted between collaborative LPs with Wagoner and solo efforts, releasing a dozen of the former and 15 of the latter. Key records include 1969‘s Top 10 smash My Blue Ridge Mountain Boy, on which she received a writing credit on every song; 1971‘s Joshua, whose title track gave her the first of many country No. 1s; and its swift follow-up Coat of Many Colors, whose eponymous ballad Parton has cited as an all-time personal favorite.
It was on 1974‘s Jolene, however, where Parton began to court the mainstream. Both its same-named lead single and future Whitney Houston blockbuster “I Will Always Love You,“ which she famously wrote on the same day, became much-loved standards, with the former also giving Parton her debut entry on the Billboard Hot 100. 1976‘s All I Can Do, meanwhile, saw her pick up the first of 54 career GRAMMY nominations (Best Country Vocal Performance, Female). By this point, Parton had outgrown the man who‘d helped steer her to country success beyond her wildest dreams. Now, the target was world domination.
Read More: 10 Songs You Didn’t Know Dolly Parton Wrote: Hits By Whitney Houston, Kenny Rogers & More
The Genre-Bending Star
While Parton has always kept one foot in country waters, her 1977 first self-produced LP New Harvest… First Gathering – featuring covers of Jackie Wilson‘s “Higher and Higher“ and The Temptations‘ “My Girl“ – kickstarted a genre-hopping streak she continued to pursue throughout the following half-century.
On the same year‘s follow-up, Here You Come Again, she teamed up with Barbra Streisand cohort Gary Klein for a million-selling, pop-oriented affair whose title track reached a then-career high of No. 3 on the Hot 100. She flirted with disco on 1978‘s Heartbreaker (“Baby I‘m Burning“) and, as its Jerry Lee Lewis-inspired title suggests, classic rock ‘n‘ roll on 1979‘s Great Balls of Fire. Her star was so rapidly rising that mainstream hitmakers Donna Summer (“Starting Over Again“) and Carole Bayer Sager (“You‘re the Only One“) queued up to give Parton some of their best works.
Free from the shackles of a major label, Parton delved deep into her love of bluegrass at the turn of the century for a trilogy of albums (1999’s The Grass Is Blue, 2001’s Little Sparrow, 2002’s Halos and Horns) that garnered some of the most glowing reviews of her career. There were also ventures into gospel (2003‘s post-9/11 response For God and Country), children‘s music (2017‘s I Believe in You), and seasonal pop (2020‘s A Holly Dolly Christmas). Then in 2023, at 77 years young, she embraced her previously hidden rock chick side on the star-studded Rockstar (more on that later).
“I’m willing to try anything,” Parton told Newsweek about her impressively eclectic approach. “What’s the worst that’s going to happen, if I can’t do it? So what, at least I tried.”
The Triple Threat
Having previously showcased her comedic skills on various TV specials, Parton was gifted the opportunity to star alongside Jane Fonda and Lily Tomlin in 1980’s feminist favorite 9 to 5. And she more than held her own alongside the two Tinseltown greats with a pitch-perfect performance as the vengeful secretary Doralee, also scoring a Hot 100 chart-topper with its two-time GRAMMY-winning and Oscar-nominated titular theme.
Parton continued to prove her double-threat credentials throughout the decade and beyond. She earned a Golden Globe nomination for her magnetic turn as brothel owner Miss Mona in 1982’s The Little Whorehouse in Texas, while simultaneously adding to the festive canon with “Hard Candy Christmas.” She even managed to draw out a relatively listenable vocal from Sylvester Stallone while starring as a club-singing mentor in 1984’s country music comedy Rhinestone.
After letting her acting do all the talking in 1989 weepie Steel Magnolias, Parton returned to double duty in 1991 TV movie Wild Texas Wind, 1992 rom-com Straight Talk, and 2012 gospel drama Joyful Noise. (All the while, she continued adding to her discography, releasing a dozen solo albums over the same period). While in 2021, she inched closer to the coveted EGOT when Dolly Parton’s Christmas on the Square was awarded the Emmy for Outstanding Television Movie.
Having conquered Hollywood, Parton switched her attention in the mid-1980s to the theme park she cleverly rechristened Dollywood. Formerly known as Silver Dollar City, the attraction near her East Tennessee hometown of Pittman Center is only part of the star’s business portfolio which also includes waterpark Dollywood’s Splash Country, the Dream More Resort and Spa, and amusement park Dolly Parton’s Stampede. Thanks to her shrewd business investments under the umbrella of The Dollywood Company – and let’s not forget her forays into cake mixes, fragrances, and canine apparel – the singer has amassed a reported fortune of $450 million.
The Philanthropist
Of course, Parton has often used the vast wealth she’s worked so hard to accrue for the greater good. In the mid-’80s, she set up the Dollywood Foundation with the main goal of increasing children’s literacy through its Imagination Library initiative.
Inspired by her father, who was never taught how to write or read, the program has since been adopted by more than 1,600 communities across the world, with approximately 3.1 million children receiving a new book each month from birth to kindergarten. By October 2024, the Imagination Library had sent out an astonishing 254 million books!
That’s far from Parton’s only philanthropic endeavor, though. She’s also helped to raise funds for various HIV/AIDS-related charities and the American Red Cross, fought for LGBTQIA+ rights (her 1991 song “Family” celebrated same-sex families), and donated $500,000 to a Sevierville cancer center to honor the physician, Robert F. Thomas, who helped bring her into the world.
Read More: 5 Ways Dolly Parton Has Promoted Peace & Global Unity
In more recent years, Parton has made headlines for her relief efforts in aid of various natural disasters. In 2016, she organized her own telethon for the victims of the Great Smoky Mountain Wildfires, raising $9 million as a result. She also donated a seven-figure sum to Vanderbilt University Medical Center during their research into the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, a period she reflected upon on single, “When Life Is Good Again.” And in 2024, she pledged $2 million to help with the recovery of her Tennessee hometown in the wake of Hurricane Helene.
“I get paid more attention than maybe some others that are doing more than me,” a modest Parton told The Tennessean in 2022 about her status as the music industry’s most altruistic figure. “I just give from my heart. I never know what I’m going to do or why I’m gonna do it. I just see a need and if I can fill it, then I will.”
The National Treasure
Parton proved she still had plenty to offer when she returned to pure country in the late 2000s. She achieved her highest peak on the Billboard 200 at the time with the first release through her own Dolly Records label, 2008’s Backwoods Barbie (No. 17), only to eclipse it just six years later when Blue Smoke made the Top 10. Soon after, she had 180,000 festivalgoers eating out of the palm of her hands when she performed classic hits including “Coat of Many Colors,” “Here You Come Again” and “9 to 5” in the Glastonbury Legends slot.
A stage musical adaptation of 9 to 5 that reached both Broadway and the West End (and earned her another GRAMMY nod) helped to extend her legacy, too. As did 2016’s Pure and Simple, which spawned her biggest U.S. tour for 25 years and became her first country chart-topper since 1991, and 2022’s Run Rose, Run, a companion album to a thriller she co-wrote with novelist James Patterson.
If any further proof was needed of Parton’s national treasure status, then she also picked up Lifetime Achievement awards at the 2011 GRAMMYS and 2016 CMAs. And although she took some persuading, the star finally accepted her place in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2023, where she also performed her 1991 hit “Rockin’ Years” and a star-studded version of “Jolene.”
Even now she’s approaching her eighties, Parton has no plans to hang up her towering high heels. “I would never retire,” she told Greatest Hits Radio in 2023. “I’ll just hopefully drop dead in the middle of a song on stage someday, hopefully, one I’ve written.”
The Beloved Collaborator
Few artists have embraced their collaborative spirit more than Parton. She recorded 12 studio albums with mentor Porter Wagoner during their stint as country music TV’s golden duo; a 13th was released following a legal dispute five years after their fruitful partnership came to an end.
She famously shared her considerable talents with a slightly more hirsute crooner, Kenny Rogers, on their worldwide chart-topper “Islands in the Stream” and 1984 LP Once Upon a Christmas. And she formed not just one but two iconic supergroups, firstly teaming up with Emmylou Harris and Linda Ronstadt for 1987’s Album Of The Year Grammy nominee Trio and its 1999 sequel, and then Loretta Lynn and Tammy Wynette for 1993’s Honky Tonk Angels.
Parton also duetted on country hits with Willie Nelson (“Everything’s Beautiful (In Its Own Way)”), Smokey Robinson (“I Know You By Heart”), and James Ingram (“The Day I Fall in Love”) during the same period. She then continued to team up with her fellow veterans throughout the ’00s and ’10s including Judy Collins (a cover of Joni Mitchell‘s “Both Sides Now”), Rod Stewart (festive standard “Baby, It’s Cold Outside”), and Yusuf Islam (“Where Do The Children Play?”).
But Parton also started working with the younger generation of artists who’d grown up listening to her music, too — and not just in the country realm. She guested on Norah Jones‘ sophomore Feels Like Home, covered one of her signature hits “Jolene” with a cappella vocal group Pentatonix, and even teamed up with Mr. Worldwide himself, Pitbull, on party anthem “Powerful Women.”
She seems particularly keen to pass the baton on to her goddaughter, Miley Cyrus; Parton co-penned (and featured on) a track for the two-time GRAMMY winner’s rootsier sixth LP, Younger Now (“Rainbowland”), invited her to perform on seasonal album A Holly Dolly Christmas, and joined her in a rendition of “Wrecking Ball” for Rockstar. The latter is unarguably Parton’s collaborative magnum opus, a 30-track foray into rock featuring a who’s who of both classic (Steven Tyler, Stevie Nicks) and contemporary artists (Lizzo, Chris Stapleton) audibly delighted at the opportunity to sing with a living legend.
In 2024, Parton kept things in the family with Smoky Mountain DNA — Family, Faith and Fables, another musical epic — this time, rooted in the sounds of her heritage — featuring her niece Heidi, cousin Richie, and, thanks to some vintage audio recordings, her late grandfather Reverend Jake Owens.
“I cannot believe that it has been 60 years this month since I graduated from Sevier County High School and moved to Nashville to pursue my dreams,” Parton remarked while announcing its release.
As one of the world’s best-loved artists both inside and outside of the country world, she undoubtedly fulfilled them in iconic, rhinestone-studded style.