Five of Dolly Parton's best songs explained

When Dolly Parton received the 2026 Academy of Country Music Poet's Award a week ago, she accepted the honour virtually due to recent health issues including dizziness and dehydration.

The award was the latest Parton had received in recognition of her songwriting.

The American musician, actor, author and philanthropist, died after a brief battle with cancer. She was 80.

In a video message posted to Instagram upon accepting the ACM award, Parton said songwriting was always "the most important part" of who she was creatively.

"Songwriting has been my therapy," she said.

"Songwriting has been my release, my joy.

"Songwriting has been a gift from God that has allowed me to touch people with words and music."

Parton was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2001, and in 2007, she received its highest honour — the Johnny Mercer Award.

Here are the stories behind some of Parton's best songs.

Jolene (1973)

The single Jolene was released in October 1973 and appeared on the 1974 album of the same name.

In 2008 Parton told NPR's All Things Considered that the name Jolene belonged to a young girl of about eight who wanted an autograph at a show.

"And she had this beautiful red hair, this beautiful skin, these beautiful green eyes … I said, 'Well, you're the prettiest little thing I ever saw. So, what is your name?' And she said, 'Jolene.'

"And I said, 'Jolene. Jolene. Jolene. Jolene.' I said, 'That is pretty. That sounds like a song. I'm going to write a song about that.'"

The story for the song came from another redhead — an adult this time — who was working as a bank teller and was paying a lot of attention to Parton's new husband at the time Carl Dean, who died in 2025.

"She got this terrible crush on my husband," Parton said.

"And he just loved going to the bank because she paid him so much attention.

"It was kinda like a running joke between us, when I was saying, 'Hell, you're spending a lot of time at the bank. I don't believe we've got that kind of money.'"

The song went seven times platinum in Australia.

Cover versions have been recorded by Olivia Newton John, the White Stripes, and Beyoncé on Cowboy Carter, which won Album of the Year at the Grammys in 2025.

I Will Always Love You (1974)

I Will Always Love You was released on the Jolene album and reached number one on the Billboard Country Music Chart.

Whitney Houston's version for the 1992 film The Bodyguard, starring Houston and Kevin Costner, took the song to new heights.

It reached the number one spot on the Billboard Hot 100 on November 28 that year and remained there for what was then a record-breaking 14 weeks.

Parton wrote the song about Porter Wagoner before she departed the syndicated television program The Porter Wagoner Show in 1974.

She had collaborated with Wagoner since 1967.

Elvis Presley wanted to record the song after it reached number one on the country charts, but his manager told Parton she had to sign over half of the publishing rights to Presley on any song he recorded.

Parton stood her ground.

"I said, 'I'm really sorry,' and I cried all night. I mean, it was like, the worst thing," Parton told Country Music Television.

"Then when Whitney came out, I made enough money to buy Graceland."

9 to 5 (1980)

Parton wrote 9 to 5 for the 1980 comedy of the same name in which she made her acting debut alongside Jane Fonda and Lily Tomlin.

The song is on Parton's album 9 to 5 and Odd Jobs.

It's an anthem celebrating women in the workplace, as well as an appeal for pay equity.

In 1980 the song led to Parton's first Oscar nomination for Best Original Song.

9 to 5 reached number one on three Billboard charts — the Hot 100, the Hot Country Songs chart, and the Adult Contemporary Charts.

It went seven times platinum in Australia.

Here You Come Again (1977)

This was a rare example of a song Parton recorded that she did not write.

Written by Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil, Here You Come Again was nominated for Best Female Pop Vocal Performance at the Grammys in 1978.

Parton had been looking for a song to broaden her appeal but was determined for it not to sound like a pop record, begging for a steel guitar so that it would still have that country sound.

The song was, however, the centrepiece of her pop crossover in the late 1970s.

The track is about the frustration felt when an ex-partner suddenly reappears when you've started to move on.

Coat of Many Colors (1971)

Parton wrote Coat of Many Colors on the back of a dry-cleaning receipt while on a tour bus, she said in her 1994 memoir My Life and Other Unfinished Business.

The song is about how Parton's mother Avie Lee Owens, who died at 80 in 2003, stitched a coat together from rags given to the family.

While sewing, she shared the biblical story of Joseph and his coat of many colours.

But while she was proud of the coat, Parton writes about the other school children "laughing and making fun of me" for wearing a coat made out of rags.

She said the song was about bullying, love, acceptance and good parents.

Parton called the song her favourite out of the more than 3,000 she wrote.

Parton released a children's book called Coat of Many Colors in 1994, as well as two made-for-television movies bearing that title. The first was released in 2015 and its sequel, Dolly Parton's Christmas of Many Colours: Circle of Love, was released in 2016.

Parton had 11 siblings and reportedly wrote her first song  when she was six years old. It was about a doll her mother made from a corncob.