Hello, Hollywood (and Dollywood)
Parton’s new life looked beyond Nashville and increasingly upon Hollywood. Her first album after declaring her independence from Wagoner was 1977’s New Harvest, First Gathering, which yielded the #11 single “Light of a Clear Blue Morning.” That same year brought the album Here You Come Again, a glitzy—and successful—attempt at a country-to-pop crossover. The CMA named Parton Entertainer of the Year in 1978, and it seemed as if she could preserve the best of both worlds.
However, Parton’s country career became erratic after that, even as her name became a household word and she became a constant presence on network TV: on talk shows, specials, and a brief, self-titled series of her own in 1976. Her movie career bounced from stellar (9 to 5) to forgettable (Rhinestone, which attempted to make Sylvester Stallone a believable country singer). Her recording triumphs included 1987’s Trio with Emmylou Harris and Linda Ronstadt and a 1993 collaboration, Honky Tonk Angels, with Loretta Lynn and Tammy Wynette. In 1992, the singer Whitney Houston recorded Parton’s “I Will Always Love You,” which became a #1 smash hit in the pop market, partly due to its inclusion in the soundtrack for the movie The Bodyguard.
Parton has also demonstrated her business acumen in several ventures, most notably the theme park Dollywood in East Tennessee, near Sevierville. In 1985, she and other investors opened the park, which has become one of the South’s leading tourist attractions. Through Dollywood and the non-profit Dollywood Foundation, Parton has contributed in many ways to her home county’s economy and to scholarship programs for high school students there. Her Imagination Library, which gives one free book a month to children from birth to age five, has distributed more than 178 million books and expanded from East Tennessee to towns across the United States and into England and Australia. She also supports the Dolly Parton Center for Women’s Services in Sevierville, and there is now a life-size statue of Parton on the lawn of the Sevier County courthouse.
Back to Her Roots
In 1996, Parton cut Treasures, an album of favorites (non-Parton songs), for the new Nashville recording label Rising Tide Entertainment. It was a critical success but did not fare well commercially. That same year, however, she and Vince Gill won the CMA’s Vocal Event of the Year award for their duet recording of “I Will Always Love You.”
Parton, Harris, and Ronstadt joined forces again for Trio II in 1999, and the supergroup’s rendition of Neil Young’s “After the Gold Rush” won a Grammy for Best Country Collaboration with Vocals. That year also found Parton coming full circle to the music she grew up hearing: she released her first bluegrass album for Sugar Hill, The Grass Is Blue. It was named Album of the Year by the International Bluegrass Music Association and won a Grammy for Best Bluegrass Album. Two additional bluegrass albums, Little Sparrow (2001) and Halos and Horns (2002), followed, and in 2003 Sugar Hill released Just Because I’m a Woman: Songs of Dolly Parton, a tribute album featuring tracks from Norah Jones, Sinead O’Connor, Alison Krauss, and Shania Twain, among others.
Parton founded her own record label, Dolly Records, in 2007. Two years later, the 9 to 5 musical debuted on Broadway. Parton wrote the production’s music and lyrics and was nominated for the Best Original Score Tony award for her work.
In 2004, the Library of Congress presented Parton with the Living Legend Award for her contributions to the United States’ cultural landscape. In 2005, she received the National Medal of Arts, the highest award given to artists by the U.S. government; a year later, she received the prestigious Kennedy Center Honors.
Parton joined the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1986 and the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2001. The Recording Academy honored her with a Lifetime Achievement Award in 2011. She has also won thirteen ACMs, ten Grammys, and nine CMAs as of April 2022.
—Chet Flippo
Adapted from theCountry Music Hall of Fame®and Museum’sEncyclopedia of Country Music, published by Oxford University Press
