Dolly Parton, the country music icon whose soaring vibrato vocals, poignant songwriting and sparkling costumes defined her rise from a log cabin in the Tennessee mountains to the height of stardom and acclaim, has died. She was 80 years old. Parton died peacefully on Tuesday in Nashville, Tennessee, her publicist said in a statement. She wrote hundreds of songs, including classics like Jolene, Coat of Many Colors and I Will Always Love You, that totalled more than 100 million worldwide sales and more than 1 billion online streams. Her career was forever influenced by her upbringing as one of 12 children born into what she called a “dirt-poor” Tennessee family. She started her education non-profit, Imagination Library, to send free books to children in Tennessee. Parton’s partnership with Porter Wagoner was key to her career. Their first duet, The Last Thing On My Mind, was released in 1967, the same year she started her own publishing company. In 1973, she had the hit that made her career — Jolene, a country music standard with its steady, churning rhythm and Parton’s repeated delivery of the title as she pleads for the woman not to steal her man. The song topped the country charts, crossing over to pop and later being released internationally, opening up new audiences for Parton. She followed Jolene with a huge hit in 1974, I Will Always Love You, an ode and farewell to Wagoner. Decades later, Whitney Houston’s version of I Will Always Love You became a smash for the soundtrack of her 1992 film The Bodyguard, and broke sales records. Houston won a Grammy for her performance in 1994, presented to her by Parton. Here You Come Again, a pop crossover hit and one of the few she didn’t write, further established Parton as a multi-genre entertainer and brought her first Grammy Award in 1979. Parton’s other crossover hits included the title song from 9 to 5, the 1980 comedy starring Parton, Jane Fonda and Lily Tomlin; and her duet with long-time friend Kenny Rogers, Islands in the Stream, written by brothers Barry, Maurice and Robin Gibb of the Bee Gees. She married Carl Dean, an asphalt paving contractor, in the mid-1960s; they were together until he died in 2025 at the age of 82. Though rarely seen in public, he was an influence on her career. She told NPR that she wrote Jolene about a flirty bank teller who seemed to take an interest in Dean. In her first major film role, Parton played alongside Fonda and Tomlin as office workers who rebel against their tyrannical boss in 9 to 5. Critic Roger Ebert called her a “natural-born movie star”, and the title song earned her two Grammy Awards and a ranking of 78 on the American Film Institute’s list of top 100 movie songs. She also became an author, her books ranging from the memoir Dolly to a bestselling novel co-authored by James Patterson, Run, Rose, Run. Beyond her music, Parton’s most lasting legacy might be her generosity and broad appeal. When a deadly wildfire swept through the Smokies in 2016, she held an all-star telethon and set up a foundation that sent monthly cheques to residents whose homes were damaged or destroyed. She opened up her Dollywood theme park in East Tennessee, a major economic driver in Appalachia that draws tourists from around the country, and established the Dollywood Foundation. She was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame and was given a Lifetime Achievement Award by the Recording Academy. She was selected for the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in 2025. With 55 Grammy nominations and 10 wins, Parton is the third-most nominated woman in Grammy history, only behind Beyoncé and Taylor Swift. When the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Foundation sent out a ballot in 2022 with her name on it, though she said she felt she hadn’t earned it, the voters answered with a “Hello, Dolly”. Parton showed up to the induction ceremony, performed, and then put out a rock album.