Dolly Parton, Country Music Superstar Whose Songs Spoke to Millions, Dies at 80
New York Times · LC · trust 54/100
Dolly Parton in 1975. She was likened to the Big Rock Candy Mountain, the Depression-era symbol of abundance. Her music confronted privation and loss even as it radiated possibility and hope. Credit... Jack Manning/The New York Times Skip to content Skip to site index
Known for her outsize persona, appearance and talent, she rose from rural poverty to become a top-selling singer, songwriter and entrepreneur.
Dolly Parton in 1975. She was likened to the Big Rock Candy Mountain, the Depression-era symbol of abundance. Her music confronted privation and loss even as it radiated possibility and hope. Credit... Jack Manning/The New York Times
Listen · 17:53 min Share full article 3.2k By Bill Friskics-Warren
Dolly Parton, a rhinestone-studded, rags-to-riches daughter of Appalachia who for six decades ruled country music — and much of pop culture — with an outsize personality and down-home wit that enshrined her as one of America’s most cherished originals, died on Tuesday in Nashville. She was 80.
Her death was announced in a video posted on social media by her nephew Bryan Seaver. No cause was provided. Concerns about Ms. Parton’s health were raised last year as she postponed and later canceled a Las Vegas residency, and intensified to the point that she took to social media in October to announce, “I ain’t dead yet.” This May, she said that she had responded well to treatment after her immune and digestive systems had, as she put it, “got all out of whack” in recent years.
From her hardscrabble beginnings to glittering stardom, Ms. Parton’s life was the stuff of make-believe. With her voluptuous figure, sparkly stage costumes and blond bouffant wigs, she was likened by the writer Chet Flippo to the Big Rock Candy Mountain, the Depression-era symbol of abundance. Her songs spoke to millions, confronting privation and loss even as they radiated possibility and hope.
She was, quintessentially, a uniter of people. In 2019, The New York Times ran a story with the headline “Is There Anything We Can All Agree On? Yes: Dolly Parton.”
Ms. Parton cannily exploited — and transcended — rural stereotypes and kitsch to fashion a folksy chic entirely her own. (“A country girl’s idea of glam,” she called it in the song “Backwoods Barbie.”) In the process, she became an international celebrity who headlined stadium tours, starred in Hollywood movies, built a business empire and appeared on the cover of Rolling Stone . Her at times girlish soprano notwithstanding, she was anything but the “dumb blonde” invoked in the title of her 1966 single.
We are having trouble retrieving the article content.
Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.
Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.
Thank you for your patience while we verify access.
Read the original at New York Times →
Open in TruthVane →