‘To me, she was an angel on Earth,’ says local tribute artist who loved country music legend who died last week
Some people are just larger than life. Some are truer to life.
Dolly Parton was both.
Since the announcement of her death on Aug. 25, I have felt this heaviness mixed with joy.
I think that’s really a perfect reminder of Dolly, who seemed a dichotomy.
Fake but real.
Tiny in stature but big in personality.
Sassy but spiritual.
It seemed she took her career, her business dealings and her legacy seriously, but herself? Not so such.
While some people laughed at her big hair and big boobs, she was counting her big money!
Yet, she wasn’t about financial gain.
From all we have ever known about her and what we have heard in the last several days, she was all about kindness, generosity and contribution.
I reached out to my friend Daphne Moens, who just happens to be a Dolly Parton tribute artist and has been since 2010, as the Ultimate Tribute to Dolly.
“Of course, I knew her but had never sung her songs before until one day I realized my voice type fits hers perfectly,” she says. “After COVID, I started to do a proper tribute, not an impersonation with a bad wig or Halloween costume outfits. I wanted to take it seriously.
“I would study her on film and on record for hours,” Moens says. “She had a huge voice. A full Dolly show is like vocal aerobics — very vocally challenging. There are so many gorgeous songs and I keep adding on to my show. I want to respect her as a person.
“Of course, there are a lot of Dolly-isms to throw in and try to get the accent right, but I want people to understand who she really was. To me, she was an angel on Earth.”
That has been the thing that has really stood out since her passing. She seemed universally loved.
Dolly was smart enough to keep her politics mostly to herself.
She also kept her marriage and home life completely out of the limelight.
What’s that saying? “What people don’t know, they can’t ruin.”
In Dolly speak, “I know when to keep my big mouth shut!”
In this world where we can’t agree on who to vote for, nor if it is sunny or raining, or even what to have for dinner, it seems we could all agree to admire Dolly.
I saw her in concert, only once, in 2008 at Casino Rama. I can’t honestly remember the whole set list. I just remember not being able to take my eyes off the stage.
She was a vision. Lots of costumes, each more glittery than the one before. I remember thinking how stunningly beautiful she was. Somehow her looks weren’t intimidating to any of us ladies who were more plain — which, in comparison, was every single one.
She was charming and disarming with her quaint old-timey stories of how her songs were born.
While I imagine we have all listened to many of her classic hits in the last week, people were talking more about her sweet spirit than the music.
In the last five years or so, I really had wondered why she was branching out into so many different business ventures.
The Imagination Library has been going for 20 years. Every month, if registered, a child between birth and age five gets a new book in the mailbox from Dolly. Four million and counting in Canada. There is a branch in London, Ont., at imaginationlibrary.com/ca.
There’s been a Dollywood theme park for 40 years, but much more recently there has been perfume, makeup, wigs, cake mixes, kitchen utensils, home décor. I just bought a Dolly Parton pink spatula which says ‘I Beg Your Parton’ from Walmart because I just wanted something tangible.
She just cut the ribbon on a new ride at Dollywood, opened Dolly’s Tennessean Travel Stop near Nashville serving her new Cup of Ambition coffee brand. There’s even a Doggy Parton dog park. A Broadway musical on her life opens next year.
Next month, a new Dolly Parton’s Song Teller hotel opens in Nashville.
I’m quite sure these ventures were not so much for the money but for the future.
As the savvy businesswoman she was, it seems she had plans for her death and her afterlife, too.
There’s an original song, somewhere in a vault, called My Place in History set for release in 20 years.
In a recent interview, Dolly was asked how she wants to be remembered.
“Mostly as a good person who did a lot in her life and tried to do good things for good people,” she said. “Mainly, I just want to be remembered.”
Dolly, you have made sure none of us can never, ever forget!