Yesterday was a devastating day for the world of music. Dolly Parton’s death has sent shockwaves throughout the world of entertainment and far beyond.
For those who knew and made music with the great woman herself, the cherished memories they have of her must now take on even more emotional significance.
One such unique insight into Parton’s process came from former Doobie Brothers and Steely Dan guitarist Jeff ‘Skunk’ Baxter who recalled working with Parton in the studio in a recent interview with our sister site, Guitar Player, prior to Dolly’s death.
A session player of great repute and a soloist extraordinaire, Baxter was quite bemused – and undoubtedly amused – by Dolly’s unique way of explaining just what she wanted from him when working on her 1978 disco-infused song Baby, I’m Burnin (which would go on to be the theme tune to her late ‘80s TV series, Dolly).
“Dolly Parton asked me to make fireworks one time,” Baxter told Guitar Player. “I was working with my Roland guitar synthesizer, and she said, ‘Can you just make it, like, reds and greens and sparkles?’
“So I thought about it for a second, and then with one hand I played as many notes as I could while the other hand was working the Roland’s [pitch] transposer, slapping it back up and down. She was going, ‘Yeah, yeah, that’s it. Whee!’”
Dolly’s instincts were right on the money, as Baxter coaxed a flourish of colour from his Roland guitar synth, which reacted to Dolly’s chorus lyric; ‘Hot as a pistol with flaming desire’ and continued to interject throughout the second verse. It’s an insight into how Dolly thought about music – and how she envisioned the arrangements for her songs. This, just one of over 3,000 original compositions that Dolly realised in her lifetime.
“I’ve always prided myself as a songwriter more than anything else,” Parton told American Songwriter. “That’s my personal feelings. That’s not to say that’s what I do best, [but] that’s my way of speaking for myself… Songwriting is a hobby and to me it’s therapy.
“I love getting on a big writing binge and staying up a couple days working on song and knowing at the end of those two or three days that I’ve created something that was never in the world before.”
Read the full interview with Jeff ‘Skunk’ Baxter over at Guitar Player
