Country music icon Dolly Parton dies at 80
Dolly Parton, whose career spanned music, TV and film, and included 11 Grammys and inductions into the Country Music and Rock and Roll Halls of Fame, has died. She was 80.
Parton’s nephew, Brian Seaver, announced the news on Instagram on Tuesday.
“My name is Brin Seaver, son of Cassie Parton, and I’m representing the Parton and Owens family today announcing the passing of my aunt, Dolly Rebecca Parton Dean, Sister, Sis and Granny to one generation and Gigi to the next,” Seaver said in a video.
“This video announcement is something Dolly asked of me years ago, before I fully absorbed it as a future reality. As her head of security for more than two decades, a role my father Larry held before me, I have imagined the heaviness of this moment but haven’t truly felt it til now,” he added.
In the last year, Parton had canceled a string of concerts and appearances due to unspecified health challenges. She announced in May 2026 that she was canceling a Las Vegas show and said she’d been undergoing treatment for kidney stones for several years.
“Lord, they dig more stones out of me a year than the rock quarry in Rockwood, Tennessee,” Parton said in a statement. “But seriously, my immune system and my digestive system got all out of whack over the past couple three years, and they’re working real hard on rebuilding and strengthening those and hopefully I’ll be up to snuff again soon.”
Born Dolly Rebecca Parton on Jan. 19, 1946, in Pittman Center, Tennessee, the country icon made her debut album, “Hello, I’m Dolly,” released in 1967, after achieving success as a songwriter for other artists.
She received 52 Grammy nominations, 11 wins, and was the second-most nominated woman in Grammy history, behind only Beyoncé, who has 79 nods and 24 wins.
Parton’s biggest hits include her three Top 10 hits on the Billboard Hot 100 — “9 to 5,” “Here You Come Again” and “Islands in the Stream.” She also has 25 No. 1 Hot Country songs like “Yellow Roses,” “Think About Love,” “Tennessee Homesick Blues” and “Jolene.”
She also saw success in Hollywood, starring in films like “9 to 5” and “The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas,” both of which earned her Best Actress Golden Globe nominations.
Parton, the fourth of 12 children from a poor Appalachian family, said her father was “one of the smartest people I’ve ever known,” but he was embarrassed that he couldn’t read.
The country music legend made it her mission over the past three decades to improve literacy through her Imagination Library book giveaway program. It expanded statewide in places like Missouri and Kentucky, two of 21 states where all children under the age of 5 can enroll to have books mailed to their homes monthly.
The singer was always recognized as a philanthropist, and when Hurricane Helene struck Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and her hometown, Tennessee, she made a $1 million donation to cover recovery efforts.
Other moments where she gave back to the community include a call she made to a fan after he had learned that his chemotherapy and radiation treatments were no longer working, and that his cancer was spreading.
“I’ve heard you’ve been a fan of mine for many years and I just wanted to thank you for that,” the singer told Gold in a video of the call shared on Instagram.
This bucket-list interaction left the Utah man feeling like he was “on top of the world.”
Never shy at expressing her Christian faith, Parton was also a public supporter of the LGBTQ community who advocated for marriage equality and spoke up in defense of transgender people.
“I keep saying: If you’re the fine Christian that you think you are, why are you judging people,” Parton said during a 2017 interview with Larry King. “That’s God’s job.”
Before her passing, the singer’s husband of 58 years, Carl Dean, had died on March 3, 2025, in Nashville. He was 82.
Parton honored her love story with Dean — who famously avoided the spotlight after not enjoying a 1967 event he attended with his wife — by releasing a song dedicated to him called “If You Hadn’t Been There” days after his passing.
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