Hello, Dolly!

RCA just announced it would reissue three early classics: ?Coat of Many Colors? (1971), ?My Tennessee Mountain Home? (1973) and ?Jolene? (1974).

In December, when Parton was honored in a Kennedy Center ceremony, both pop and country stars turned out to pay homage. Performing her songs: Carrie Underwood, Kenny Rogers, Alison Krauss, Shania Twain and Jessica Simpson (even if she couldn?t remember the words to ?9 to 5?). But it was veteran country singer Reba McEntire who summed up Parton?s pioneering legacy: ?Once, a woman in Nashville was told what song to sing, in what clothes and just how to sit on the stool while singing it. ... Because of Dolly, we?re here writing, producing and singing our own music.?

At the time, Dolly wasn?t aware of blazing trails.

?I?m one of those people who didn?t know it couldn?t be done until I already had it accomplished,? she says.

By the numbers, she?s unparalleled. From ?I Will Always Love You? and ?Islands in the Stream? to ?Here You Come Again? and ?9 to 5,? 25 of her songs have hit No. 1 on the Billboard Country charts, an all-time record for a female artist. She has 41 career top-10 country albums, a record for any artist, and 110 charted singles over the past 40 years. She?s won seven Grammys and been nominated for 42.

She?s working on a new album, ?Backwoods Barbie,? due out this summer, featuring a cover of the Fine Young Cannibals song ?She Drives Me Crazy? and a reprisal of her 1966 hit ?Put It Off Until Tomorrow? with Emmylou Harris and Rodney Crowell. She would also like to start her own cosmetics line and a weekly children?s television show.

Parton single-handedly inspired the Wells Fargo Center to book its first large-scale show outside its Mark West Springs Road venue.

When she came through Santa Rosa on her ?Vintage? tour in 2005, she couldn?t fit her massive stage production into the 1,500-seat former church ? ?tiny and cute,? as she called it. So when her manager offered a return date, WFC programming director Rick Bartalini sought out a larger venue, settling on the Grace Pavilion at the Sonoma County Fairgrounds in Santa Rosa. It paid off. Three thousand tickets, ranging from $39 to $149, sold out in less than two hours.

Parton just sold out two nights at Wembley Stadium in England, and Bartalini estimates he could have sold at least another 3,000 tickets here in Sonoma County.

Her charming hillbilly tale ? the fourth of a dozen kids, born and raised in a tiny cabin in the Tennessee hills, grows up to be a global phenomenon ? is universal. Whether in the country or the city, she appeals as both a simple woman of the people and a timeless, showy gay icon.

?It?s the same sort of thing as Cher ? she?s a survivor,? says Rialto Cinemas owner Ky Boyd, who saw her 2005 show in Santa Rosa. ?She?s come from nothing and she?s made herself glamorous. And she?s easy for drag queens to imitate.?

When she sings ?Drag Queen? to the tune of ?Jolene,? well, ?you just got to laugh along with that,? says dairy farmer Ralph Bettinelli, whose family has worked the land outside Petaluma for four generations.

At 68, he?s never seen her in concert, but he knows she would be right at home on his farm, where ?us ranch kids all grew up listening to Western music.?

?When she was a young kid, if I remember right, she followed her ancestors behind the house chasing varmints. I did that in my younger days,? says Bettinelli, who is paying $149 to see Parton in Santa Rosa. ?She?s just down-to-earth. She?s herself. You don?t find too many people like that.?

Or, as Wilson says, ?You can take the girl out of the mountains, but you can?t take the mountains out of the girl.?

The same charming honesty, all bundled up in her ?Frederick?s of Dollywood? facade, is exactly what the gay crowd loves in her.

?I think more than anything, people respond to me because they know I accept them,? says Parton. ?I accept myself as I am. I accept them as they are, and I think people sense I have a heart full of love.?

You can reach Staff Writer John Beck at 521-5300 or e-mail at jbeck@pressdemocrat.com. News researcher Michele Van Hoeck contributed to this report.