Dolly Parton shares her favorite song she’s ever written and it might surprise you
Dolly Parton didn’t have the most luxurious childhood, but she wouldn’t trade it for anything.
The 78-year-old country music legend took some time out of her day for a brief Q&A with fans, courtesy of The Guardian, when her “often heartbreakingly hard” childhood got brought up.
“Everybody where we grew up had a hard time. We were mountain people,” she said in response to a question about how those circumstances led her to success.
“We had good parents, but we didn’t have all the big luxuries that I’m able to afford now. But I wouldn’t trade it for nothing,” she added.
While the “Jolene” singer said she grew up poor, she didn’t realize her family was poor until some “smart-head” said so.
“You don’t think about that until you’re away,” she explained.
Parton was born Jan 19, 1946, and grew up along the Great Smoky Mountains in Locust Ridge, Tennessee, according to the singer’s official website.
She was the fourth of 12 children but wasn’t the only one to have a successful career in music.
Her younger sister, Stella Parton, has released more than 30 albums and many of her other siblings have or had careers in music, according to Hello Magazine.
Earlier this year, Dolly Parton announced her upcoming album, “Dolly Parton & Family: Smokey Mountain DNA – Family, Faith & Fables,” which explores the origins and legacies of both sides of her family, says Today.
The album will be released this month and will be her 50th studio album since releasing her 1967 debut album “Hello, I’m Dolly.”
In her recent Q&A, the “9 to 5” singer said that she’s proud of all the songs she wrote, but one stands out as the “most personal” to her: “Coat of Many Colors” from her 1971 album of the same name.
“It talks about my mom, my parents, and kind of gives you an insight,” she explains. “It also covers bullying, acceptance and all that.”
She also described “I Will Always Love You” as one of her greatest love songs and “Jolene” as her most recorded song.
“Do you know that song has been recorded, somebody told me, 450 times in the last 52 years,” she said in the Q&A.
As for what she thinks of the men who sing “Jolene,” she seems to prefer it.
“My voice is so high-pitched and I have all those little trills – it sounds better as a man’s voice,” she adds.
But the thing she remembers most about creating that song was the famous guitar lick she invented for it.
“I was playing guitar pretty serious back then, before I had all the long nails. I remember all the guys learning to play it and everybody thinking how cool a rhythm it was. It was a little out of the norm for the things we’d been doing up to that time,” she explained.
In a separate question, a fan asked if the songs “Jolene,” released in 1973, and “I Will Always Love You,” released the following year, were written on the same day, which has been a rumor for years.
While she doesn’t know the exact answer, she does know that the songs were found on the same cassette and were likely both written during that period of time.
But even 50 years later, Parton still has no plans of stopping anytime soon.
“Oh, my Lord, I can’t retire,” she said in the Q&A. “I always say I’ve dreamed myself into a corner. I’ve got to keep all those dreams alive.”
And while earlier reports claimed she was done touring, Parton describes it as “misinformation.”
“I still do shows – I just don’t go on the full-blown tours where I go overseas for weeks,” she clarified, adding that she enjoys spending time with her husband, Carl Thomas Dean, too.
“So, no. I couldn’t retire if I wanted to. And I don’t want to,” she concluded.
Parton’s newest album will be released Nov. 15, 2024, and will contain at least 37 songs, according to the artist.
