Dolly Parton spent years saying that her music did not need to stop when she did. The first release since her death has now arrived.
“Bound to Ride,” recorded by Parton with the First Ladies of Bluegrass around 2022, was released September 9 as her first posthumous recording. Parton died August 25 at age 80 after a brief battle with cancer.
The traditional song was popularized by the Stanley Brothers with their 1964 recording, but Parton’s version came together under unusual circumstances. During a COVID-19 surge, she stayed in her own studio while the First Ladies of Bluegrass recorded the instrumental track separately, according to Rolling Stone.
Parton did far more than simply send back a vocal. She added ad-libs, encouraged the musicians during their solos and called members of the group by name, giving producers what they later described as “the full Dolly.”
Parton Recorded Her Vocal Separately During a COVID Surge
The First Ladies of Bluegrass on the recording are Alison Brown on banjo, Becky Buller on fiddle, Sierra Hull on mandolin, Missy Raines on bass and Molly Tuttle on guitar. The musicians developed the arrangement while Parton remained at her own studio because she was taking precautions during the COVID surge.
Buller sang a scratch vocal in what the group believed would be a comfortable key for Parton as they worked through the song. Their new arrangement also included an eight-bar bridge drawn from a lesser-known verse of “Bound to Ride.” Parton later received the completed backing track and recorded her performance separately.
Producer Garry West told Rolling Stone that no one knew exactly what Parton would send back. “She really did over-deliver,” he said, adding that the musicians could not have gotten anything better. Parton’s finished vocal included shout-outs to the individual players, including encouragement as they moved through their instrumental parts.
The Song Leads Into a New Stanley Brothers Tribute
“Bound to Ride” appears as the second track on Where the Soul Never Dies: Celebrating 80 Years of The Stanley Brothers, which will be released October 16 through Compass Records.
The official track listing brings together musicians from several generations of country, bluegrass and Americana. Willie Nelson and Sierra Ferrell perform “I’ll Fly Away,” Dierks Bentley joins Della Mae for “How Mountain Girls Can Love,” while Steve Martin, Ed Helms and Brown appear together on “Pardon Me, Stranger.”
The album arrives two days before Carter and Ralph Stanley are inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame on October 18. Brown and West produced the project, which grew out of an effort to revisit songs that have become so familiar within bluegrass that listeners and even musicians may no longer immediately associate them with the Stanley Brothers.
Most of the album was recorded live in the studio. Parton’s contribution was one of the exceptions, making the energy of the finished recording especially striking considering that she and the other musicians were not performing together in the same room.
Parton Had Already Prepared for Music to Be Released After Her Death
Parton had talked openly about leaving enough material behind for new releases long after she was gone.
In the final episode of Dolly Parton’s America, she said she had “hundreds, hundreds, even thousands of songs,” many of which had never been recorded. She was also intentionally preserving vocals with click tracks so producers in the future could construct entirely new arrangements around them.
“There’s enough stuff to go on forever with my music,” Parton said. She explained that a producer could eventually take one of those vocals and build an arrangement in virtually any style.
She described herself as someone who believed in being prepared and said she did not want her catalog left in confusion after her death. The plan was not simply to preserve completed recordings. Parton wanted future producers to have material flexible enough to become new projects decades later.
“Bound to Ride” was not assembled from one of those unfinished vocal archives. Parton completed the performance herself years before her death, but its release is the first example of new Parton music reaching listeners after she was gone.
Her Team Says Parton Left a Roadmap for What Comes Next
Parton’s planning extended beyond music. After her death, longtime manager Danny Nozell said she had spent several years working with a handpicked team on projects she wanted to continue after her lifetime.
Nozell told PEOPLE that Parton helped build a project roadmap intended to guide her team “for decades to come.” He said unreleased music, books, products and other projects already in development carried her approval.
One unusual piece of that musical planning will require a much longer wait. Parton placed an original song, “My Place in History,” inside a time capsule created for the DreamMore Resort and instructed that it remain unheard until around the 100th anniversary of her birth in 2046.
For now, “Bound to Ride” is the first new recording released in the weeks after her death. The full Stanley Brothers tribute album arrives October 16.