Watch: Audience gasps as Dolly Parton’s death is announced on stage at 9 to 5 musicalYour support helps us to tell the story
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The news of Dolly Parton’s death has been met with widespread heartbreak after the country music icon died at 80 following a “brief battle” with cancer.
According to TMZ, the singer will be buried in the mausoleum at Woodlawn Memorial Park in Nashville, Tennessee, next to her husband Carl Dean, who died last year.
Singer Miley Cyrus, Parton’s goddaughter, remembered her “Aunt Dolly” as an “angel,” saying, “I will always love her and want to make her proud.
“My heart breaks for the world, her family and friends who will miss her deeply,” Cyrus said.
Everyone from Taylor Swift and Beyoncé to Eminem and Linda Ronstadt paid tribute to Parton, describing her as “the gift that kept on giving” and saying her legacy would be “an everlasting one.” Paul McCartney also remembered Parton, saying her songwriting, singing, and philanthropy were “unrivaled in the world of country music.”
Parton’s nephew Bryan Seaver announced the news of her death saying: “Dolly has lived in the light and is in the arms of Jesus.” Her representative later confirmed that she had died at Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center in Nashville, surrounded by loved ones.
US president Donald Trump ordered flags to fly at half-staff in the US to honor Parton, writing: “This is a true loss for millions of people. There has never been anyone like her, and never will.”
Full story: Country legend dies aged 80 after a brief battle with cancer
Her death was announced by her nephew, Bryan Seaver, in an Instagram video posted Tuesday afternoon. The musician’s publicist confirmed Parton’s cancer diagnosis to the Associated Press later in the day, but did not give further details on her illness.
“Our beloved Dolly Parton spent her life and career bringing joy, laughter, hope and integrity into everything she touched. Her unmatched generosity reached the lives of countless people whom she would never meet, yet she was always there to offer a helping hand,” the statement from her reps to People magazine read.
“Whether it be the hundreds of millions of books donated through her invaluable Imagination Library or funding research that helped create a lifesaving vaccine used around the world, Dolly’s unconditional love for all people was the guiding force for her lasting impact. After bravely facing a brief battle with cancer, Dolly departed her Earthly life today at the Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center surrounded by loved ones.”
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Jacob Stolworthy & Kevin E G Perry26 August 2026 04:08
The Elvis deal Dolly Parton refused and why it paid off
Dolly Parton once turned down the chance to have Elvis Presley record “I Will Always Love You” because his manager wanted a share of the song’s publishing rights.
Presley loved the song and planned to record it, but the night before the session, Colonel Tom Parker told Parton that Elvis would not record a song unless his team received publishing rights or “at least half the publishing”, as Parton recalled.
She refused. “This is the most important copyright in my whole publishing company, and I can’t do that,” she remembered telling him.
“I cried all night,” she told CMT in 2006 about her decision. “It was like the worst thing. You know, it’s like, ‘Oh, my God … Elvis Presley.’”
It was a painful decision at the time, but Parton retained ownership of the composition, which became enormously valuable when Whitney Houston recorded it for The Bodyguard in 1992. Houston’s version spent 14 weeks at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100, turning Parton’s song into a global standard.
Shahana Yasmin27 August 2026 11:00
Dolly Parton gave her name to the world’s most famous sheep
Dolly Parton became the namesake of one of the most famous animals in scientific history when the first mammal cloned from an adult cell was named after her.
Dolly the sheep was born at Scotland’s Roslin Institute on July 5 1996, after scientists used a cell taken from the mammary gland of a six-year-old Finn Dorset sheep. She was cloned using a technique called somatic cell nuclear transfer and became the first mammal successfully cloned from an adult cell.
Professor Ian Wilmut with Dolly the sheep in the National Museums of Scotland (Maurice McDonald/PA) (PA Archive)
“Dolly was christened by John Bracken, one of the men who paced anxiously about day and night as we waited for the birth of the lamb,” Ian Wilmut, the scientist who led the Roslin Institute team that cloned Dolly, told Nature in 2007.
Dolly lived for six years and died in 2003. Her body was preserved and is now displayed at the National Museum of Scotland in Edinburgh.
Shahana Yasmin27 August 2026 10:45
Dolly Parton turned her fingernails into an instrument for 9 to 5
Dolly Parton’s famous acrylic fingernails became part of the sound of 9 to 5 and they were even credited on the soundtrack.
While writing the song on the set of the 1980 film, Parton did not have her guitar with her, so she used her nails to tap out the rhythm and imitate the sound of a typewriter.
“I used my nails just to get the rhythm when I wasn’t close to my guitar,” she explained in a 1981 interview with KCRA in Sacramento.
(AP)
Parton demonstrated the technique during the interview, joking: “Ladies and gentlemen, you are now viewing the newest instrument on the market.”
She later explained that her nails were officially credited on the 9 to 5 soundtrack as “nails by Dolly”. The song went on to become one of her signature hits and earned her an Academy Award nomination for best original song.
Shahana Yasmin27 August 2026 10:30
Dolly Parton’s Dollywood employees can go to college for free
Dolly Parton’s influence on Dollywood extended to a benefit designed to help its employees build lives beyond the theme park: workers can attend college without paying tuition, fees, books, or required supplies.
Through Dollywood’s GROW U programme, employees are eligible for 100 per cent tuition coverage from their first day of employment. The benefit is available regardless of their role in the company, meaning seasonal and frontline workers can pursue education without taking on student debt.
The programme covers more than 150 academic programmes, including degrees and certificates in areas ranging from business and hospitality to healthcare and technology.
(Reuters)
Shahana Yasmin27 August 2026 10:15
Comment: The world’s richest men could learn a lesson from ‘progressive hillbilly’ Dolly Parton
The Independent’s Associate Editor Sean O’Grady writes…
Reflecting on the death of Dolly Parton, a colleague encapsulated her remarkable life outside music in punchy terms: “Dolly was a progressive hillbilly… take that JD Vance!”
Indeed she was. But she was so much more than that…
She was someone who put her money where her mouth is, and used her own vast personal fortune – like her songs, mostly her own work – to do good.
Had she not given so much of her wealth away, she would have died a billionaire. Not in the same class as Elon Musk (estimated worth around $800bn) or Jeff Bezos ($250bn), but plutocratic all the same…
Her activities strike an uncomfortable contrast with the current generation of tech billionaires, far wealthier than she was, but who seem to want to keep their money entirely to themselves and their pet businesses, and, in some cases, indulge in obscene levels of conspicuous consumption.
Rachel Dobkin27 August 2026 10:00
Dolly Parton spent 35 years helping protect bald eagles
Four days before Dolly Parton died, Dollywood announced the next chapter of a conservation partnership she had helped sustain for 35 years.
Since 1991, Dollywood and the American Eagle Foundation have worked together to care for bald eagles and educate visitors about America’s national bird. Their partnership included Eagle Mountain Sanctuary at Dollywood, where non-releasable eagles were housed and displayed.
The sanctuary was damaged by a storm earlier this year, and the birds have since been cared for at the American Eagle Foundation’s 50-acre conservation and education campus in Kodak, Tennessee.
On August 21, the organisations announced that those eagles would remain there permanently.
“For 35 years, our partnership with the American Eagle Foundation has allowed millions of Dollywood guests to learn about and appreciate the bald eagle and other birds of prey,” said Eugene Naughton, Dollywood Parks & Resorts President. “We look forward to continuing our work together, and we plan to continue inspiring our guests to care for these remarkable birds and the natural world around us.”
The partnership has also contributed to broader conservation efforts: the American Eagle Foundation says it has successfully released more than 400 bald eagles into the wild.
Shahana Yasmin27 August 2026 09:45
Dolly Parton expertly shut down this woman who tried to fashion shame herDolly Parton expertly shut down this woman who tried to fashion shame her
Shahana Yasmin27 August 2026 09:30
Dolly Parton’s greatest quotes
Dolly Parton: A life in quotes
Parton was among the most beloved personalities in music and beyond, a rare celebrity whose appeal transcended generations, geography and politics
Jacob Stolworthy27 August 2026 09:15
Dolly Parton secretly recorded a song for a time capsule – which won’t be opened until 2046
Dolly Parton secretly recorded new music, which has been sealed inside a time capsule that won’t be opened until the year 2046.
The track, titled “My Place in History”, was placed by the late queen of country in a wooden box at Dollywood’s DreamMore resort, which opened back in 2015.
In her book Songteller: My Life in Lyrics, Parton reveals that the resort’s staff have been specifically instructed to leave the box unopened until the date she specified: what would have been her 100th birthday on 19 January 2046.
Jacob Stolworthy27 August 2026 08:45