Country music legend Dolly Parton, whose six-decade career made her one of the most recognizable and influential figures in American music, died Tuesday at the age of 80 after a brief battle with cancer.
Parton’s nephew, Bryan Seaver, announced her death on Aug. 25 on behalf of the Parton and Owens family, saying the country music icon “has lived in the light and is in the arms of Jesus.”
“It is an honor, an honor that is mixed with absolute pride and great sadness. But sadness lies with us, not with Dolly. Dolly has lived in the light and is in the arms of Jesus, surely met by Carl, her parents and countless others who have watched her and longed to meet her in the heavens,” he said.
Born in rural Tennessee in 1946 as one of 12 children, Parton was introduced to music through the church where her grandfather served as a Pentecostal preacher. After graduating from high school, she moved to Nashville and eventually built a career that stretched across more than six decades, producing enduring songs such as “Jolene,” “9 to 5,” “Coat of Many Colors” and “I Will Always Love You.”
Over the course of her career, Parton collected 11 Grammy Awards along with numerous Country Music Association and Academy of Country Music honors. She also found success as an actress and became widely known for her charitable work, particularly the Imagination Library, which has distributed books to children around the world.
Parton often spoke openly about the Christian beliefs that had shaped her since childhood. In a 2019 interview with The Christian Post, she recalled an older woman telling her when she was young that she was “anointed.” When Parton later asked her mother what that meant, her mother told her, “That means that God has His hand on you; that you may do something special.”
Parton said that experience stayed with her and helped shape her belief that her talents came with a responsibility to serve God and other people.
“I never let go of that,” she told CP. “I always felt responsible to God that I was supposed to be doing something for God. I still feel like that, and I'm still doing it, trying to. Sinning all the way, but trying my best, and asking forgiveness seventy times seven.”
“I really feel like I have a calling. I always felt I had a mission,” Parton said. “I feel like God had told me early in a feeling that I was supposed to go until He told me to stop. Until God says stop, I’ll keep going.”
