ARLINGTON, TEXAS - NOVEMBER 23: Dolly Parton performs at halftime during the game between the Dallas Cowboys and the Washington Commanders at AT&T Stadium on November 23, 2023 in Arlington, Texas. (Photo by Brandon Sloter/Image Of Sport/Getty Images)
Dolly Parton has passed away, her family confirmed on Tuesday (August 25) in a sweet, emotional video. Her nephew revealed that she had asked him years earlier to announce her passing when the time came. She was 80.
No details have been revealed about the singer’s cause of death. However, according to a statement from her publicist, Dolly Parton died peacefully on Tuesday in Nashville, Tennessee
Her nephew mentioned that he hopes she’ll be welcomed in heaven by her husband, Carl Dean, who was an asphalt paving contractor. In the mid-1960s. They were together until his death in 2025 at the age of 82. Though rarely seen in public, he influenced her career. She told NPR that she wrote ‘Jolene’ about a flirty bank teller who seemed to take an interest in Dean.
Parton was a country music icon whose soaring, vibrato-laden vocals, poignant songwriting, and sparkling costumes took her from her log cabin in the Tennessee mountains to the heights of stardom. Others might remember her curvy physique, massive blonde wigs and skin-tight outfits and stage style.
Parton also plucked bejeweled banjos, guitar and dulcimers with her long fingernails during performances. She wrote hundreds of songs, including classics like ‘Jolene,’ ‘Coat of Many Colors’ and ‘I Will Always Love You.’ That music totaled more than 100 million worldwide sales and more than 1 billion online streams. With 55 Grammy nominations and 10 wins, Parton is the third-most nominated woman in Grammy history, only behind Beyonc and Taylor Swift.
Parton’s career was forever influenced by her upbringing as one of 12 children born into what she called a “dirt poor” Tennessee family. Her first musical performances were in church, where her grandfather was a preacher. By age 10, she was learning guitar and singing on local television shows. At 13, she appeared on the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville. By the mid-1970s, Dolly Parton was a Nashville queen.
Outside of music, Dolly Parton was a generous philanthropist and successful businesswoman. Her projects included a theme park in the Smoky Mountain foothills near her birthplace. She started her education nonprofit, Imagination Library, to send free books to children in Tennessee because her father struggled to learn to read. He had quit school to work on the farm.
