Mountain angel

Dolly Parton soars on Little Sparrow

by Ted Drozdowski

Dolly Parton has put in her time as a nine-to-fiver. She's employed her marvelous voice punching the country-music industry's clock with schlock hits like "Here You Come Again" and "Islands in the Stream," a duet with one of the genre's princes of Vegas, Kenny Rogers. She wrote "I Will Always Love You," a simple little pledge that became breathless '90s hyperbole under a severe beating from Whitney Houston's melodramatic pipes. And she's taken camp turns in the movies 9 to 5, Steel Magnolias, and The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas. Parton's even the theme of her own theme park, Dollywood, which is nestled in a notch in the Smoky Mountains named Pigeon Forge.

Yet somehow none of that has diminished her shine. One reason is the sweetness of her voice, an instrument of astounding power and clarity with a gentle, ever-present vibrato that kneads sincerity into even the most shameless Music Row ballads. There's also her accent, a Southern hill-country twang that speaks of her birth in poverty in Locust Ridge, Tennessee. It's a reminder Parton never seems to need, for no matter how big a star she's become she always appears genuinely grounded -- a nice, talented person whether acting with Burt Reynolds, belting a tune on a Grammy broadcast, or chatting with fans. Perhaps that's why so many of us who grew up with Dolly's presence have felt good about her even when her work's been dubious. She's always seemed like one of us, and we want our friends to do well.

As an artist, Parton has never done better than her two most recent albums, the new Little Sparrow and 1999's The Grass Is Blue (both on Sugar Hill). Both are roots recordings in the most literal manner. They romance the bluegrass and Appalachian mountain music she first heard and performed as a child -- music that earned her a Grand Ole Opry debut in 1958, when she was a 12-year-old prodigy.

Little Sparrow in particular cuts close to home. Although bluegrass is a strong undercurrent here -- the disc is full of hot banjo, guitar, and fiddle -- the accent is on the kind of spirituals and ballads that emerged as the progeny of the Europeans who settled in the Southeastern hills and developed their own music. It's the stuff that Dolly, who by age five had made her own guitar, sang as a girl on the Cass Walker Farm and Home Hour radio show on Knoxville's WIVK. But now it is informed by the experience of a 54-year-old woman with a long career of making music.

Little Sparrow is spectacular and often sad, showing perhaps for the first time the depths of emotion that Parton can reach. Her voice is terribly fragile in "My Blue Tears," one of seven songs that descend to various levels of pain over love gone wrong -- the lowest being the madness that rends the life of the spurned "Mountain Angel." Parton wrote both numbers, though the latter sounds like a classic English folk ballad transposed to hillbilly country. It's the story of how a young woman loses her virtue to a mysterious stranger who then abandons her, leaving the tale to wend a gothic path through ruin and stillbirth and images of witchcraft and Satan.

The beauty and perfection of these songs comes not only from the direct, expressive poetry that springs from Parton's heart to her pen and voice but from her company. Alison Krauss, a star in her own right, sings impeccable harmony on several numbers. Established solo artists Maura O'Connell, Rhonda Vincent, and Rebecca Lynn Howard also sing harmony. And the instrumentalists are among the finest in Nashville. They can swing gracefully through a grassed-up reading of Cole Porter's "I Get a Kick out of You" or make their notes stick as hard in the throat as the words of "Down from Dover," another of Dolly's tragedies about a young woman cursed by love.

Perhaps some of Parton's sadness comes from the loss of her father, Lee, who died shortly before these sessions. Certainly Little Sparrow is deeply personal. Parton says that the title is in a sense a description of her. "I'm little, and sometimes I'm sad too," she explains in the CD's media biography. "I've been billed as the Smoky Mountain Songbird. And my daddy used to call me his little songbird."

Since birds are neither solitary nor noticeably unhappy creatures, Little Sparrow also has its celebrations of joy. The giddy "Marry Me" is as virginal as "Mountain Angel" and "Down from Dover" are spoiled. The song is old-school country, with a straight-four banjo rhythm and mandolin and fiddle breaks that elicit happy shouts from Parton. Her lyrics capture the free-spirited thrill of teenage romance amid the Norman Rockwell charm of a barn dance, but they were inspired by the flirtatious antics of her nieces, who swooned over her musicians in the studio.

The spiritual standard "In the Sweet By and By" and many of Parton's spirited performances put wind under Little Sparrow's wings. But altogether these songs are more of experience than of innocence. And from that experience Parton has made an album that rivals not only her own earlier work but nearly everything else in contemporary country.