Dolly Parton & Porter Wagoner
A country duo of Dolly Parton and Porter Wagoner that began when she joined his television show in 1967 and produced fourteen top ten hits for RCA Victor, among them "Daddy Was an Old Time Preacher Man" (1970).
The Porter Wagoner Show
Porter Wagoner was born on August 12, 1927 in Howell County, Missouri, near West Plains, signed to RCA in the early 1950s, joined the Grand Ole Opry in 1957 and hosted The Porter Wagoner Show, a syndicated television program that ran from 1960 to 1981 with 686 episodes taped. In 1967 Dolly Parton joined the show and his road show, replacing Norma Jean. In late 1967 he helped get her signed to RCA Victor, and her first single was a duet with him, Tom Paxton's "The Last Thing on My Mind", a country top ten hit in January 1968 that began a run of top ten duets lasting six years. The Country Music Association named them vocal group of the year in 1968.
In 1969 Wagoner became her co-producer, and he owned nearly half of Owe-Par, the publishing company she founded with Bill Owens. The Hall of Fame counts fourteen top ten hits and one number one, with Wagoner the de facto producer and arranger on thirteen duet albums.
The records
The duet albums are Just Between You and Me (1968), Just the Two of Us (1968), Always, Always (1969), Porter Wayne and Dolly Rebecca (1970), Once More (1970), Two of a Kind (1971), The Right Combination * Burning the Midnight Oil (1972), Together Always (1972), We Found It (1973), Love and Music (1973), Porter 'n' Dolly (1974), Say Forever You'll Be Mine (1975) and Porter and Dolly (1980). Among the singles were "We'll Get Ahead Someday" (1968), "Just Someone I Used to Know" (1969), "Daddy Was an Old Time Preacher Man" (1970), "Better Move It on Home" (1971), "The Right Combination" (1972), "Please Don't Stop Loving Me" (1974, their only number one) and "Making Plans" (1980, number two). Bear Family issued Just Between You and Me: The Complete Recordings, 1967-1976 in May 2014, six discs, which AllMusic gave five stars.
Parton left the show in 1974, with her last duet concert that April, and wrote "I Will Always Love You", number one that year, about the professional break; the two reconciled in the late 1980s and performed together several times. Wagoner entered the Country Music Hall of Fame in 2002, made his last album, Wagonmaster, in 2007 with Marty Stuart producing, and died on October 28, 2007, aged 80, after which Parton held a memorial concert at Dollywood.
Albums
- Once More 1970 · RCA Victor
Their 1970 duet album of ten songs, including three by Parton and the hit "Daddy Was an Old Time Preacher Man".
Songs
- Daddy Was an Old Time Preacher Man Once More · 1970
Parton's tribute to her grandfather, a Pentecostal minister, written with her aunt Dorothy Jo Hope and a number seven country hit for the duo in 1970.
Sources
- Porter Wagoner, Wikipedia
- Dolly Parton, Wikipedia
- Porter Wagoner, Country Music Hall of Fame
- Once More (Porter Wagoner and Dolly Parton album), Wikipedia