Crossroads Podcast: Dolly Parton’s Songs Reveal Her Faith, Heart and Soul
When her husband Carl Dean died, Dolly Parton released her own tribute with the single, “If You Hadn’t Been There.” The key lines were poignant: “The ups and downs / We've always shared / And I wouldn't be here / If you hadn't been there.”
In this week’s “Crossroads” podcast, I argued that if the mainstream press wanted to understand this very public, but still mysterious, superstar, they needed to study the fine details in her songwriting and in her philanthropy. In other words, pay less attention to her glitzy media image and focus on her heart, mind and, yes, soul.
The tribute to her blue-collar, no frills, carpenter husband was highly symbolic. Now, it appears that Parton will make her own final statement about her life and work with a special song that will be released on her 100th birthday. ABC News reported.
An unreleased song titled “My Place in History” remains locked inside a chestnut box at Dollywood’s DreamMore Resort in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee, the theme park confirmed. … Parton wrote and recorded the song in 2015, the year the resort opened, with instructions that the box remain sealed until Jan. 19, 2046, which would have marked her 100th birthday.
What will the song say?
I do not know, of course, but I would argue that Parton has already offered the world crucial insights in her art and in the many ways to worked to help “her people” in the mountains of Appalachia and beyond. In a tribute for the Free Press, Hannah Long shared this metaphor that I have, for years, heard used by folks I know in our Southern Highlands:
To Appalachians like me, this is something like the passing of Queen Elizabeth II. Dolly was an icon, a figurehead, a spiritual grandmother. … Her theme park, Dollywood, is a huge tourism draw for the impoverished communities of eastern Tennessee — and Dolly Parton fans from all over the world. Picture Disney World with more Jesus.
Indeed. Just the other day, I offered a Rational Sheep post about some pro-level Disney observers who visited Dollywood and pondered the many ways it was different from the Kingdom of Mouse.
For example, while there is a lot of Dolly at Dollywood (#DUH), the park isn’t really about selling her media products — while Disney parks are shopping malls for all things Disney pushed in screens culture. Dollywood offers a squeaky clean tribute to the families, faith and culture of the Smoky Mountains. It’s a dreamy vision of a real place — the land that, for decades, has considered Dolly its queen.
You will, at Dollywood, see traces of Dolly the “9 to 5” Hollywood pop star and symbol of female empowerment. But you won’t find that in the chapel she had built on the grounds (imagine a church at Disney World) or in the bluegrass, folk and Gospel music in which Dollywood has been baptized.
In the podcast — which centered on hours of CNN coverage and some crucial doctrines from The New York Times — I urged listeners to find an often overlooked trilogy of albums that Parton released at the turn of the century and dig deep into the lyrics. When many of her fans voiced concerns that she had forgotten her roots, Dolly rallied a team of killer bluegrass players and released “The Grass is Blue,” “Little Sparrow” and “Horns and Halos” (click links to hear all this music).
On the crucial first disc in that set, she ended with a heart cry that is almost hard to listen to at the moment. In a way, she had already written an anthem for the day of her passing — “I Am Ready.”
Turn this up. Here is a sample:
I am ready
Oh, my children
When Jesus knocks at my door
I’ll be there come morning
Don’t weep for me
I’ll be with my Lord
There’s my Bible on the table
Read it to me once more
I can hear God’s heavenly angels
Singing me on through heaven’s door
Hallelujah Lord
I am ready
No more sorrow
Hallelujah, yes
I am ready, I am ready
I am ready to go
In the final disc of the trilogy, she threw down this gauntlet in the title track for “Horns and Halos.”
Tempted and tried with each step we take
We stumble and slide and make our mistakes
Ask God to forgive us for all of our sins
Then we take off our horns and wear halos again
Halos and horns, sinners and saints
Hearts that are torn between what’s wrong and ain’t
Just because it feels right does not make it so
So we struggle through life in horns and halos
That’s Dolly Parton.
Now, I would argue that a solid obit for this remarkable singer, musician, songwriter, business woman and philanthropist needed to include, as quotations, some of what she said in the work she took most seriously — her songs.
The songs point to many of the stands she took that troubled conservatives, primarily calls for dignity for all kinds of saints and sinners, as well as the (#triggerwarning) biblical faith drawn from her daily season of prayer and Bible study, first thing in the morning. She often said that it was this time of prayer and reading that led to her best songwriting.
No, I don’t know what the Bible study was when she wrote “Jolene” and “I Will Always Love You” — on the same day. But someone needs to look for the major themes in her 3,000 songs.
Could we trust AI to do that? How about the New York Times?
Let’s look at one crucial passage at the end of the main Times feature: “Dolly Parton, Superstar Whose Songs Spoke to Millions, Dies at 80.” Here is a crucial thesis statement:
… Perhaps even more remarkable than the profusion of accolades and awards was Ms. Parton’s unstinting generosity of spirit — her commitment, born of deep religious convictions and an immense heart, to seeing the humanity in all people.
Perhaps the Times could have been a bit more specific than “deep religious convictions”? You think?
After all, the official family statement about her death would have been easy to quote. Bryan Seaver, son of Cassie Parton, said that, “Sadness lies with us, not with Dolly. Dolly has lived in the light, and is in the arms of Jesus. Surely met by Carl, her parents, and countless others who have watched her and longed for her to meet them in the heavens.”
For the Times team, the crucial point to make was that Parton outgrew her Christian past and, ultimately, this is what mattered. She escaped those mountains.
Parton not only sang the traditional Southern gospel music her mother taught her; she also wrote and sang “Travelin’ Thru,” an Oscar-nominated song from “Transamerica,” the 2005 movie about a transgender woman seeking to connect with her son. In 2017, Ms. Parton collaborated with Miley Cyrus, her goddaughter, to record “Rainbowland,” a tribute to gay pride and liberation.
“You have to accept everything and everybody,” she said in “Songteller,” talking about the lessons to be learned about open-mindedness and inclusion from “Coat of Many Colors.”
Time and again in her career, Ms. Parton reflected on her impoverished upbringing and how she followed her dreams to escape it. “I wanted to be free,” she told Rolling Stone in 1977. “I had my songs to sing, I had an ambition, and it burned inside me.”
Hey, what about that classic song, “Coat of Many Colors”? I would argue that it is the essential Dolly song for those who want to understand what made her tick.
For the Times, this is a song that is ultimately about (#WaitForIt) bullying.
In “Coat of Many Colors,” maybe her most beloved original, Ms. Parton plumbed childhood feelings of pride and humiliation. In this case, the coat in question — quilted from rags and originally a source of delight and the expression of a mother’s love — becomes an object of ridicule when Dolly’s classmates poke fun at her for wearing it to school. …
But what is the actual biblical symbol that is the backbone of this story-song? Maybe that’s worth a mention?
Readers: In press reports did you hear this passage from the lyrics, focusing on Parton’s mother and the faith she was trying to teach?
As she sewed, she told a story
From the Bible she had read
About a coat of many colors
Joseph wore and then she said
Perhaps this coat will bring you
Good luck and happiness
And I just couldn’t wait to wear it
And momma blessed it with a kissMy coat of many colors
That my momma made for me
Made only from rags
But I wore it so proudly
Although we had no money
I was rich as I could be
In my coat of many colors
My momma made for me
In the end, Dolly said that she told that Bible story to the bullies, but they just could not hear it. They just didn’t “get” what gave her hope.
But they didn't understand it
And I tried to make them see
That one is only poor
Only if they choose to be
Now I know we had no money
But I was rich as I could be
In my coat of many colors
My momma made for me
Made just for me
Memory eternal, Dolly Parton.