The world lost an icon, but her family lost their beloved matriarch.
It’s hard to believe it’s been over a week since the queen of country music, Dolly Parton, passed away at 80 years old in Nashville, Tennessee. She is of course a beloved singer, songwriter, philanthropist, actress, playwright, and author died peacefully in her home state.
Dolly comes from a huge family, she had 11 brothers and sisters who all have children, and several of her siblings, nieces, and cousins have been speaking out in the wake of her passing, which came as a shock to the world after it was later revealed that she faced a “brief battle with cancer.”
And of one of Dolly’s longtime collaborators and family members, her cousin Richie Owens, opened up to People about Dolly’s funeral service, which at her request, was a small private service. It was held for immediate family last week, and her nephew previously revealed to TMZ that Dolly will be buried “in her signature high heels and a comfortable cotton dress” in the mausoleum at Woodlawn Memorial Park and Mausoleum in Nashville, Tennessee, where her late husband Carl Dean is buried.
Richie told the TODAY audience that his cousin was exactly who she was in front of the world in her private life too, calling her “magical” and “very giving”:
“What you saw from Dolly is how she was in real life, at home, personable, magical just very giving. You got the same thing. She didn’t turn it on and off. Dolly was always Dolly. She had the greatest sense of humor.”
In true Dolly fashion, Owens explained that she wanted her funeral to be very small with just her family members and close friends, and he said they did it quietly and quickly, as she wouldn’t have wanted everyone dwelling and being sad:
“She wanted to keep it very quiet. The word keeps getting brought up — a funeral — and I don’t think that was really the case in this situation; it was more a burial to be buried beside her husband. And she wanted it real small and a few family members were there.
It was very quiet and very quickly done. And not for any bad reasons whatsoever, it’s just that’s what she wanted. She wanted to keep it very, very private.”
Dolly also wanted fans to make donations to her beloved Imagination Library Foundation in lieu of other gifts of flowers, which is another example of her giving spirit and how much taking care of others really meant to her:
“She would much rather see people take that $50 they were gonna spend on flowers and give it to her Imagination Library. She said that many, many times. She really cared about her charities.”
Dolly and Richie worked together a lot of over the years, and he produced her 1998 album, Hungry Again, as well as her 1999 album, Precious Memories.
Their entire family was and is very musical, and Richie recalled the last time they were together in person, he was helping Dolly locate a guitar that Dolly had as a little girl, that Riche’s father had given her in 1958. Eventually, they were able to find one in the same make and model that Dolly had as a little girl:
“The last time that I was physically with her, we had went back and forth helping find and locate a little guitar that she had from when she was a kid, my father had given her back in 1958, it was a little Martin guitar, it was a little baby-sized style.”
They documented the whole process with the Martin guitar company, and Riche got to present it to her, which sounds like a beautiful final memory:
“We got it all documented with the Martin guitar company, and they turned around too because of that and her love for little Martin guitars, they made her a Martin guitar with her butterfly there at the end. That was the last time with her that I was with her and I was able to present her those guitars.”
Richie says, as we all know, her cousin was a “workaholic,” calling her “magic”:
“That lady was a workaholic. She was relentless. The lady was just magic, it poured out of her.”
And Dolly also apparently kept her health struggles pretty private from her family too, as like others have mentioned, she didn’t want anyone to worry about her and wanted to keep it all positive and keep lifting everyone else up:
“She of course posted herself that she had been going through health problems, but nobody really knew what a lot of that was, including myself. She’s always kept things private because she wanted to keep everybody being positive around her. And put that out there in the world, ‘Don’t worry about me, I’m gonna be fine. Just show the love.'”
The response to Dolly’s death has been overwhelming, and the entire world truly lost a beloved, iconic performer, musician and most of all, person. She was truly incredible and one-of-a-kind.
The interview also includes never-before-seen footage of Dolly performing with Richie at a Knoxville family concert 2024:
