Dolly Parton, Queen of Country Music, Dies at 80

Legendary singer-songwriter and country music icon Dolly Parton has died at the age of 80.

Her nephew revealed the news in a Aug. 25 Instagram video.

Parton shared an update on her health on Friday, Aug. 21, acknowledging her recent decline after the March 2025 death of her husband, Carl Dean.

“As I’ve shared in video messages throughout the past year, I am dealing with some health issues that I just didn’t pay attention to when I was watching over Carl. You know, this isn’t the first time I’ve had to manage something like this. Back in the early ’80s, I was down for several months with female issues, and I was struggling with my weight at the time too, so it’s not like I haven’t been through hard times with my health,” Parton told PEOPLE.

She added: “But I think because we live in a 24/7 world with social media, everything gets magnified in ways it wasn’t years ago. I used to joke that I was the Queen of the Tabloids, but now I guess I can say I’m the Queen of Social Media AI! Seriously, though, even though I’m still healin’, I’m still workin’! You know me — as I’ve often said — I’ve dreamed myself into a corner and I still have so many things I want to achieve, so I’m gonna keep on working as long as I can to see everything come to life.”

With a distinguished career that lasted decades, Parton is the best-selling female country music artist of all time, having sold more than 160 million albums worldwide. Her debut album was 1967’s Hello, I’m Dolly, and she went on to release a slew of hits, including “I Will Always Love You,” “9 to 5” and “Jolene.”

Parton was born in Pittman Center, Tenn., in 1946. She had 11 siblings, and the family was poor. “We never actually starved, but sometimes we never had quite enough to eat,” she told PEOPLE in 1977. At age 6, she began playing her first guitar and singing in her grandfather’s church. She started writing songs a year later.

Though she was known for her glamor as an adult, she told PEOPLE in 2003 that growing up, “I had freckles and a gap in my teeth. Everything was homemade or hand-me-downs. . . . I always wanted to be prettier. I got to fixin’ myself up. I wanted my clothes tight, my makeup bright, my nails long, my lips red. I got into it.” Over her career, she received considerable attention for her dramatic appearance, but she was always the first one to make a joke of it.

After her high school graduation, she moved to Nashville in 1964. She played in clubs and wrote songs for other artists. She told PEOPLE in 2012, “My songs got me out of the mountains and took me everywhere I’ve wanted to go.” Her big break came when country star Porter Wagoner hired her to be his sidekick on The Porter Wagoner Show. He helped her land a record deal, but her early successes were all duets with her costar.

“I’ll always be a country musician because I’m a country girl,” she told PEOPLE in 1975. “My style is my soul and my feelings. I’ll tell the world in my songs what I wouldn’t have told my mother.”

In 1971, she had her first country No. 1 with “Joshua.” “Coat of Many Colors,” released the same year, reached No. 4. Then in 1973, she released “Jolene,” which was a country No. 1 and also charted on Billboard‘s Hot 100.

Parton stopped appearing on the TV show in 1974, and she wrote “I Will Always Love You” as a goodbye to her creative partner, Wagoner. “When I got ready to go, it was not a good scene. So I went home and that song just came to me. The next morning I said, ‘This is how I feel.’ Tears were rolling down his face,” she told PEOPLE in 2012.

The song topped the country chart twice, but it became a megahit when Whitney Houston recorded it for the 1992 film The Bodyguard. She told PEOPLE in 2015 about the first time she heard Houston’s version of the song on the radio. “It was a worldwide thing. It was in a movie; it was No. 1. I thought, ‘Wow. I wrote that little song,’ “ she said. “That’s when I felt my worth as a songwriter. I thought, ‘This is my gift, and I’m going to do the best I can with it.’ ”

Parton continued to enjoy success with hits like “Light of a Clear Blue Morning,” “Here You Come Again,” “Two Doors Down,” “It’s All Wrong, But It’s All Right” and “You’re the Only One.”

By the end of the ’70s, Parton’s ambitions reached beyond Nashville; some worried she was leaving country music behind. She said in 1977, “I want people to know there is a lot more to me — good or bad — than they’ve seen so far. All I’m askin’ is a chance to prove it. . . . . I’m not leavin’ Nashville. Roots are important to me, and my roots are here.”

Parton’s movie career began in 1980 when she starred in 9 to 5 with Lily Tomlin and Jane Fonda. Her theme song for the movie became her first No. 1 single on the Hot 100. The costars became lifelong friends, and Parton later made a guest appearance on their Netflix TV series Grace and Frankie.

In 1982, she played a madam in The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas alongside Burt Reynolds. “I make a better whore than a secretary,” she told PEOPLE in 1982. Parton also starred in 1984’s Rhinestone with Sylvester Stallone, 1989’s Steel Magnolias and 2012’s Joyful Noise.

In 1987, Parton released the critically acclaimed album Trio with Linda Ronstadt and Emmylou Harris. She told PEOPLE in 2003 that they “were like sisters,” explaining, “We didn’t always agree, but we had a great sound. Our first Trio album was one of the greatest pieces of music I’ve ever been involved in.”

During her career, Parton won an Emmy, 11 Grammy awards, 10 Country Music Association awards, seven Academy of Country Music awards, three American Music awards and earned two Academy Award nominations, as well as an honorary Oscar. She was one of only seven female artists to win the Country Music Association’s Entertainer of the Year award.

The music icon was also inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1999. During the memorable ceremony, she performed her hit song “Coat of Many Colors.” Parton’s close friend and “Islands in the Stream” duet partner Kenny Rogers presided over her induction.

Parton’s vibrant life was adapted into a musical titled Dolly: A True Original Musical that premiered in Nashville in July 2025 with plans of transferring to Broadway in 2026.

“I wanted to see it done while I’m still around, to be able to oversee it and make sure that it’s done properly in a way that I would want to see it, rather than to wait till I’m gone and let somebody else decide how they think it should be done,” she said in a press conference announcing the show’s premiere.

She also wrote the score for the Broadway adaptation of 9 to 5, for which she received a Tony nomination. In 2005 she received the National Medal of Arts, and in 2006 she received Kennedy Center Honors. In November 2022, she was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.