One of the most iconic breakup songs of all time – but it was actually about a professional breakup and not her love life.
Dolly Parton got her start in music at an early age, singing on local television and radio in East Tennessee. She made her Grand Ole Opry debut at just 13 years old, and signed her first record deal – as a pop singer – in 1965.
Her big break in country music, though, came when Dolly joined the Porter Wagoner Show in 1967 and became a staple on the program until she left in 1974 to pursue a much bigger, more fulfilling solo career.
In the 2003 movie Dolly Parton: Platinum Blonde, Dolly spoke candidly about the fact that she wanted “big time management” and a worldwide career, which is something she couldn’t achieve if she stayed on the show after her five-year contract:
“I wanted to have big time management. I wanted to get in movies by that time. I wanted to do everything that a body could do as an entertainer.
I wanted to be worldwide. I thought, well, if I’m gonna be a star, why not be a big star?”
Dolly had started out making $60,000 with Porter, which at the time, was obviously way more money than she’d ever seen or really heard of in her life as someone who grew up dirt poor in the hills of east Tennessee.
But apparently, Porter rarely ever gave her a raise, and Dolly felt it was unfair that he was making so much money off of her because she became the star of the show very quickly:
“I started working for Porter for $60,000 a year. That was what the deal was, and that was more money than I’d ever seen or heard tale of.
But the thing is, Porter didn’t raise me very much, but that was one of the reasons I had to go, because I was part of his group. He was making all the big money too because of me.”
To attempt to keep her from leaving, Porter tried to convince Dolly that her label at the time, RCA, would drop her if she left his show:
“Porter had tried to convince me, and had told me over and over, ‘They’re gonna drop you as son as you leave the show, they’re not gonna want you at RCA.’
So before I had left Porter’s show, I flew up to New York from Nashville on my own, made appointments with some of the main people at RCA. I said, ‘Well, I’m here to say that I’m going out on my own. I’m going to be leaving the ‘Porter Wagner Show.’
I’m going to make a big change here. I’m gonna get some pop producers, I want to try to bridge the gap from country.’ They were very excited, they got totally behind me.”
But Porter wasn’t going to make it easy: He filed a $3 million lawsuit against Dolly that was eventually settled out of court. But Dolly wanted to talk to Porter about her decision, though she knew he was way past “listening to what I have to say.” So she decided to do it the best way that she knew how: With a song.
As Dolly recalled, she sat down and wrote a breakup song to explain to Porter how she was feeling about the two parting ways:
“I knew that it was going to be damaging, and I didn’t want that. I thought, well how am I ever gonna tell this man how I feel? I thought, well I write songs, he won’t listen to me, he’s way past listening to what I have to say.
So I wrote this song, and it came totally from the bottom of my broken heart.”
That song was, of course, “I Will Always Love You,” which would go on to become one of her biggest hits, and one that gained new life after it was covered and released by Whitney Houston in 1992. And as Dolly recalled, it was after she performed the song for Wagoner that he finally understood where she was coming from in wanting to leave:
“It’s saying, ‘Just because I’m going don’t mean I won’t love you. I appreciate you and I hope you do great and I appreciate everything you’ve done, but I’m out of here…’
And I took it in the next morning. I said, ‘Sit down, Porter. I’ve written this song, and I want you to hear it.’ So I did sing it. And he was crying. He said, ‘That’s the prettiest song I ever heard. And you can go, providing I get to produce that record.’ And he did, and the rest is history.”
“I Will Always Love You” was released on March 8, 1974 as the second single from her album Jolene, and quickly reached #1 on the charts as it became one of the best-selling singles of the year. In fact, Elvis even wanted to record his version of the song – but Dolly refused when she was asked to sign over half of the publishing rights to Elvis for him to record the song.
A smart move on Dolly’s part – and a song that still remains one of the greatest country songs ever written.
