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Dolly Says Singing Her Iconic Hits Can Be Boring, But There’s One Thing That Makes It Easier: “They’re The Ones That Are Making You The Money”
Be careful what songs you cut… you never know what might become a hit.
Over the years, we’ve heard plenty of artists talk about how it can get old playing your biggest hits over and over… Waylon Jennings famously hated “Luckenbach, Texas (Back to the Basics of Love),” Tyler Childers doesn’t even play “Feathered Indians” anymore, and even Dolly Parton says her most iconic song can be boring to play live, even though it’s one fans always look forward to hearing the most.
And while I completely understand how playing the same song night after night for years on end can get exhausting, of course, many of us fans also look forward to hearing the hits at a concert, so that’s why it’s important for an artist to be very careful when it comes to only cutting songs they really love, because you really never know what might take off.
As a recent example, Ella Langley and Riley Green both have said they never thought “You Look Like You Love Me” would become the mega viral, award-winning success that it is, and I’m sure 20 years from now, they might now be as jazzed about singing it live, but that just comes hit hitting it big, and I think they all understand that…
But Dolly has seemingly found some sort of solution to keep it exciting when she plays “I Will Always Love You” and that would be that she changes up the arrangement and tune from time to time.
But she says fans don’t always appreciate that, because they want to hear it exactly how it was originally recorded, and I can’t blame them for that:
“It’s different singing songs that are hits over and over than it is trying to do the same show over and over. You want to change all that up just for the color of it. But when you’ve got your songs… sometimes I’ll sing it a little bit different.
I’ve had fans say, ‘I don’t like it when you change the tune,’ because they’re used to hearing it like they hear it on the record. They don’t like hearing a change in something that they love.”
It’s a balance between staying true to the original, and keeping it fresh she doesn’t get too burnt out on it:
“I try to be as true to the songs as I can, but you never really get tired of singing the songs that are hits, because you see the reaction that it gets and it gives you a feeling of great pride.”
Dolly has played “I Will Always Love You” thousands of times over her illustrious, decades-long career, but she also says the audiences excitement for it helps keep her excited to perform:
“You’d think singing ‘I Will Always Love You’ 2000 times in your life or more that you would get tired, but they’re always different because the audience is different, and that night your mood is different.
I mean, it’s like you don’t feel the same every day. Something might have happened to someone you love or you might be going through something personal. My voice does take on different expressions in my songs. I feel it when it’s coming out, I never plan anything. I think that they mean something different all the time.”
But being the savvy business woman that she is, of course, Dolly knows there’s a HUGE upside to scoring as many massive hits as she has over the years:
“You never get tired of singing your hits, because they’re the ones that are making you the money.”
Spoken like a true queen…
You will have a chance to hear her sing all of her hits live, as Dolly heads to Las Vegas in September of 2026 for her residency at Caesar’s Colosseum, which was rescheduled from December of this year following some personal health issues.
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The post Dolly Says Singing Her Iconic Hits Can Be Boring, But There’s One Thing That Makes It Easier: “They’re The Ones That Are Making You The Money” first appeared on Whiskey Riff.
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