Your Dolly Parton Tributes

**Brian Lehrer** (0:19)
From the 1980 album Nine to Five and Odd Jobs, now we'll take your tributes to the one and only Dolly Parton, who of course died yesterday at the age of 80, after what her team called a brief battle with cancer. And from what I'm seeing, the news came the way Dolly wanted it to in a video message from her nephew, recorded years in advance at her request. So listeners, the phones and text thread are open for tributes or favorite song. Which one can you not hear this morning without crying? Or maybe you made the pilgrimage to Dollywood and saw her in concert somewhere.
And maybe you met Dolly. A lot of people did, you know, through her imagination library and other philanthropic work.
Tell us about that experience. What did Dolly Parton mean to you? 212-433-WNYC-433-9692. One text to get us started. Dolly Parton never forgot her roots and used her success, money and music, to uplift others. And with us as your calls come in is the one, the only Ann Powers, music critic and correspondent for NPR. She's got a new piece called Dolly Parton Didn't Just Write Hits. She created an American songbook. Ann, welcome back to WNYC, hey.

**Ann Powers** (1:44)
Hey, it's always a pleasure to talk, Brian, even on a sad occasion like this.

**Brian Lehrer** (1:48)
Indeed. So what's the first thing that went through your mind when the news came yesterday?

**Ann Powers** (1:53)
Well, I got to tell you, I was in the most appropriate place I could have been. I was at the hair salon. And I think Dolly would have appreciated that.
And it really ran through the whole, I live in Nashville, as you know, for those who don't know. And it, you know, ran through the whole salon like wildfire and everybody's phone started blowing up and people were just in shock. I think even though we knew Dolly had been having some health troubles, you know, none of us could really accept it. We just, she was someone who we thought might live forever. She's so larger than life. It seemed like she could beat the things that normal people can't, you know. So it's a huge loss.

**Brian Lehrer** (2:35)
Aubrey in the Hudson Valley, you're on WNYC. Hi, Aubrey.

**Aubrey** (2:39)
Hey, Brian. Thanks for having me.
I just wanted to say I lead a group girls guitar class. And every week we work on other music by women. And last week, I thought to myself, I think it's time to do Dolly. And then of course, the news broke yesterday. We worked on Jolene. And after the class, I got a really sweet text message from a man who just wanted to recognize what a loss this is for women everywhere and how important it is that women carry on her legacy, not only in music, but also in kindness and philanthropy and feminism and all of it. So I just wanted to, that's all I wanted to say.

**Brian Lehrer** (3:19)
Orby, thank you very much. Do you want to talk, Ann, at all about what she meant to women in particular?

**Ann Powers** (3:25)
Oh, absolutely. I mean, in the appreciation I wrote for NPR, I talked about how she really documented the changes in women's lives. She didn't just document them.
She was an empathetic channel for what women went through. Actually, what women always go through, but particularly in the era in which she became a star, the time when women's liberation came into view, when misogyny was being talked about openly. Dolly wrote songs that were so heartfelt, but expressed the difficulties of being a woman, the joy of being a woman, what it's like to be a working woman, all of those things. I think she was such a role model for so many people. It's rare that a celebrity, in my opinion, deserves to be called a role model, but Dolly really does deserve it.

**Brian Lehrer** (4:23)
Listen to writes, aside from being an absolutely good person inside and out, she also spoke about her endometriosis diagnosis in time that very little was known about it. Another one, Dolly was humanism in action, what we desperately need more people to be today.
Another one, she was a strong, expressive woman, just how I tried to be every day, writes that listener. Anita in Manhattan, you're on WNYC. Hi Anita.

**Anita** (4:56)
Hi, how are you? I'm so happy to be here today.

**Brian Lehrer** (5:00)
Hi Anita. We're so happy to have you.

**Anita** (5:03)
Thank you so much. I just wanted to have an opportunity to tell everybody how much I love Dolly. I actually got a chance to meet her. I used to work for a country music station called WYNY back in the 90s. Oh wow, yeah, I remember. With Kim Kerr and Kelly Sunstein. Yeah.