Country Music Legend, Singer and Songwriter Dolly Parton who wrote hit songs ‘Jolene’ and ‘I Will Always Love You’, has died at age 80. It is speculated that she had cancer
Dolly Parton passed on Tuesday August25, 2026 just 4 days after Saying, “She still had so many things she wanted to achieve’ even at 80 years old.
Her nephew, Bryan Seaver, revealed the news in an Instagram video the same day.
“My name is Bryan 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,” he says in the 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 until now.”
Seaver added: “It is an honor, an honor that is mixed with absolute pride and great sadness. But 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 to meet her in the heavens.”
A new musical about the life of Dolly Parton is to be launched next year on what would have been the late singer’s 81st birthday. In addition, a US museum dedicated to her stellar career is due to open this autumn. A museum called ‘Dolly’s Life Of Many Colours’, referencing her 1971 song and album Coat Of Many Colours, is due to open in Nashville, Tennessee, in the next few months.
According to her: “My whole life has been a musical”
This autobiographical musical was the passion project of Parton’s final years. She said in a statement last month: “My whole life has been a musical. A grand ole opera really, and I can’t wait to present it to you on Broadway.
“I hope you enjoy watching as much as I’ve enjoyed livin’ it.”
‘Dolly: A True Original Musical’ follows ‘9 To 5’ The Musical, which premiered in 2008 and was based on the 1980 film 9 To 5, starring Parton, Jane Fonda and Lily Tomlin, and the song of the same name from her concept album 9 To 5 And Odd Jobs.
9 To 5 is currently on a UK tour. Gasps were heard at the Pavilion Theatre in Worthing on Tuesday night when news of Parton’s death was announced from the stage.
In addition to her groundbreaking work as a singer-songwriter, Parton also starred in movies like ‘9 to 5’ and ‘Steel Magnolias’
Dolly Parton’s nine-to-five approach to Music, Life and Business
Even when she was talking about cold, hard cash, Dolly Parton managed to seem down to earth.
“It’s hard for me to spend money on tonnes of stuff because I’m going to look the same, no matter what I wear. If I wear diamonds I’m still going to look like a rhinestone,” she told BBC.
Still, if Dolly was inclined to buy diamonds, she could afford them. She’s known as much for her business acumen as her song-writing skills.
At the start of her career she took lessons from her dad, she says: “Even though he wasn’t an educated man, he wasn’t able to read and write, daddy had a great sense of business.
“He said, ‘Don’t let other people take advantage of you, keep your mind on your business.’ So when I got into the music business I thought of it as a business.”
“As soon as you start making money, you should invest and get into other businesses that you can fall back on if you don’t make it big, or if you make it big and you fall on hard times.”
That attitude served her well over the years and continues to do so, according to Forbes magazine’s Celebrity 100 list.
It claims Dolly earned $37m (£28m) in the year to June 2017, with most of this coming from her Pure and Simple concert tour and income from her Dollywood theme park in Tennessee.
Early on she launched her own publishing company and hung on to the rights to her songs, and she says that other artists should do the same.
Brian Warner, founder of website CelebrityNetworth.com, estimates her total fortune to be $500m (£379m) but says this is conservative. “We think that Dollywood alone is worth around $200m; $100m for the land itself and $100m for the brand – you could class it as an intangible asset.
“On top of that she makes a lot of money from touring and has had a 50-year career in which she’s sold millions of records and has also written songs for other artists.”
Mr. Warner says “I will always love you”, a hit Dolly wrote and recorded in 1973, has made her more than $20m in total.
According to her Nephew, Bryan Seaver “I first went on the road with Dolly as a kid, getting a taste of the road life in the early 1980s. Dolly opened doors not just for me but for her entire family to reach the potential we didn’t even know was possible. Dolly also opened doors for generations of singers, songwriters, musicians and dreamers from every walk of life and across every continent,” Seaver added in the video message. “By her example, we believed that anything is possible. She never saw a door she couldn’t open, and the doors she opened made and changed history.
His statement continued: “My family and I have shared a lifetime of beautiful memories with Dolly, but so have you. She has always been on your television, your record player, your CD and on your phone playlist, becoming an extended part of your family whether you liked it or not. Our family and the team she has entrusted with her legacy will work diligently to ensure her spirit will live with us forever. Dolly was a farmer, just like her daddy; he farmed the soil, she farmed songs and happiness. Dolly called me and said she wants to rest in a beautiful bed of plush cotton because after a life of wearing heavy rhinestones, she finally deserves to be comfortable and have some rest.”
Seaver ended his statement, saying, “Rest in peace, Aunt Dolly — Aunt, Granny, Gigi. May God bless Dolly Parton, and may God bless you all. She will always love you.”
Dolly shared an update on her health on Friday, Aug. 21, acknowledging her recent decline after the March 2025 death of her husband, Carl Dean.
“As I’ve shared in video messages throughout the past year, I am dealing with some health issues that I just didn’t pay attention to when I was watching over Carl. You know, this isn’t the first time I’ve had to manage something like this. Back in the early ’80s, I was down for several months with female issues, and I was struggling with my weight at the time too, so it’s not like I haven’t been through hard times with my health,” Dolly Parton told PEOPLE MAGAZINE.
She added: “But I think because we live in a 24/7 world with social media, everything gets magnified in ways it wasn’t years ago. I used to joke that I was the Queen of the Tabloids, but now I guess I can say I’m the Queen of Social Media AI! Seriously, though, even though I’m still healin’, I’m still workin’! You know me — as I’ve often said — I’ve dreamed myself into a corner and I still have so many things I want to achieve, so I’m gonna keep on working as long as I can to see everything come to life.”
Her Life and Career
Dolly Parton was born in Pittman Center, Tenn., in 1946. She had 11 siblings, and the family was poor. “We never actually starved, but sometimes we never had quite enough to eat,” she told PEOPLE in 1977. At age 6, she began playing her first guitar and singing in her grandfather’s church. She started writing songs a year later.
With a distinguished career that lasted decades, Parton is the best-selling female country music artist of all time, having sold more than 160 million albums worldwide. Her debut album was 1967’s Hello, I’m Dolly, and she went on to release a slew of hits, including “I Will Always Love You,” “9 to 5” and “Jolene.”
Though she was known for her glamor as an adult, she told PEOPLE in 2003 that growing up, “I had freckles and a gap in my teeth. Everything was homemade or hand-me-downs. . . . I always wanted to be prettier. I got to fixin’ myself up. I wanted my clothes tight, my makeup bright, my nails long, my lips red. I got into it.” Over her career, she received considerable attention for her dramatic appearance, but she was always the first one to make a joke of it.
After her high school graduation, she moved to Nashville in 1964. She played in clubs and wrote songs for other artists. She told PEOPLE in 2012, “My songs got me out of the mountains and took me everywhere I’ve wanted to go.” Her big break came when country star Porter Wagoner hired her to be his sidekick on The Porter Wagoner Show. He helped her land a record deal, but her early successes were all duets with her costar.
“I’ll always be a country musician because I’m a country girl,” she told PEOPLE in 1975. “My style is my soul and my feelings. I’ll tell the world in my songs what I wouldn’t have told my mother.”
In 1971, she had her first country No. 1 with “Joshua.” “Coat of Many Colors,” released the same year, reached No. 4. Then in 1973, she released “Jolene,” which was a country No. 1 and also charted on Billboard‘s Hot 100.
Parton stopped appearing on the TV show in 1974, and she wrote “I Will Always Love You” as a goodbye to her creative partner, Wagoner. “When I got ready to go, it was not a good scene. So I went home and that song just came to me. The next morning I said, ‘This is how I feel.’ Tears were rolling down his face,” she told PEOPLE MAGAZINE in 2012. The song topped the country chart twice, but it became a megahit when Whitney Houston recorded it for the 1992 film The Bodyguard. She told PEOPLE in 2015 about the first time she heard Houston’s version of the song on the radio. “It was a worldwide thing. It was in a movie; it was No. 1. I thought, ‘Wow. I wrote that little song,’ “she said. “That’s when I felt my worth as a songwriter. I thought, ‘This is my gift, and I’m going to do the best I can with it.’ ”
Parton continued to enjoy success with hits like “Light of a Clear Blue Morning,” “Here You Come Again,” “Two Doors Down,” “It’s All Wrong, But It’s All Right” and “You’re the Only One.”
By the end of the ’70s, Parton’s ambitions reached beyond Nashville; some worried she was leaving country music behind. She said in 1977, “I want people to know there is a lot more to me — good or bad — than they’ve seen so far. All I’m askin’ is a chance to prove it. . . . . I’m not leavin’ Nashville. Roots are important to me, and my roots are here.”
Parton’s movie career began in 1980 when she starred in 9 to 5 with Lily Tomlin and Jane Fonda. Her theme song for the movie became her first No. 1 single on the Hot 100. The costars became lifelong friends, and Parton later made a guest appearance on their Netflix TV series Grace and Frankie.
“People say, ‘Well, you’re going to be 80 years old.’ Well, so what? Look at all I’ve done in 80 years. I feel like I’m just getting started,” she says. “I know that sounds stupid, but unless my health gives way, which right now I seem to be doing fine . . . I think there’s a lot to be said about age. If you allow yourself to get old, you will. I say, ‘I ain’t got time to get old!’ I ain’t got time to dwell on that. That’s not what I’m thinking about.”
She also reflected on her impact and intentions in the industry. “I’m at that point in my life where I just want to be able to do good things that can be carried on. I’m proud of my legacy so far, and I hope to just continue to do things that might be of use to other people,” Parton told PEOPLE at the time.
“You know, I have just been going so fast my whole life,” Parton added in the same interview. “And I just start thinking, ‘How in the world did I even have a life? How did I even get it done?’ I really realized when I was putting this book together just how much I had sacrificed in my life. I never had children, so at least I didn’t have a guilty feeling. I’m thankful that I got to see my dreams come true.”
Additional Sources: TMZ, People Magazine, BBC
