{"id":2392166,"date":"2026-04-28T00:11:48","date_gmt":"2026-04-28T00:11:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/?p=2392166"},"modified":"2026-04-28T00:11:48","modified_gmt":"2026-04-28T00:11:48","slug":"50-years-ago-dolly-emmylou-and-linda-debut-new-supergroup","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/50-years-ago-dolly-emmylou-and-linda-debut-new-supergroup\/","title":{"rendered":"50 Years Ago: Dolly, Emmylou, and Linda Debut New Supergroup"},"content":{"rendered":"<br><div id=\"pryc-wp-acctp-original-content\">\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-large\"><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<p><br\/>About the only thing that could possibly ever top the beauty and majesty of the voices of Dolly Parton, Linda Ronstadt, and Emmylou Harris, is all three of them together. <\/p><p>Their 1987 album\u00a0<em>Trio<\/em>\u00a0is considered one of the crowning achievements in country music history. Just like country music\u2019s other major <strong><a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/savingcountrymusic.com\/a-compendium-of-country-music-supergroups\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title=\"\">supergroup<\/a><\/strong> The Highwaymen, it wasn\u2019t just the star power assembled in Trio, but the way these three iconic voices of country music conjoined together seamlessly and selflessly that made a sound greater than the sum of its parts.<\/p><p>The\u00a0<em>Trio<\/em>\u00a0album won the ACM for Album of the Year in 1987, and the CMA\u2019s Vocal Event of the Year in 1988. The group also won the 1988 Grammy for Best Country Performance by a Duo or Group, and was nominated for the Grammy\u2019s all-genre Album of the Year. <em>Trio<\/em> was Certified Platinum by the RIAA, and was succeeded by the Gold-Certified\u00a0<em>Trio II<\/em>\u00a0in 1999.\u00a0<em>The Complete Trio Collection<\/em>\u00a0combining all of the supergroup\u2019s work including rare takes was released in 2016.<\/p><p>But this wasn\u2019t where the collaboration of these three sirens of country music started. It all began 50 years ago today, April 27th, 1976, on the set of the syndicated TV show <em>Dolly!<\/em> <\/p><p>Dolly Parton came up at a time when country music variety shows were all the rage. She was introduced to much of the world as the sidekick and harmony singer of Porter Wagoner on <em>The Porter Wagoner Show<\/em>. Of course as time went on, Dolly Parton started stealing the show, and became so beloved, it was time for her to leave Porter Wagoner\u2019s side and shadow. Dolly left in 1974, penning \u201cI Will Always Love You\u201d for Wagoner upon her departure. <\/p><p>In 1976, Dolly Parton would star in her own short-lived, syndicated 30-minute television show simply called <em>Dolly!<\/em> At the time, Dolly, Emmylou Harris, and Linda Ronstadt were already friends, and already had been conspiring to perhaps collaborate together in some capacity. Aligning the schedules of the three stars to record an album proved to be difficult. But when Parton launched <em>Dolly!<\/em>, they were all able find a stitch in their schedule to appear together. <\/p><p>It was during the taping of the second episode of <em>Dolly!<\/em> where the three first appeared together. In 1975 on her album <em>Prisoner In Disguise<\/em>, Linda Ronstadt had covered the old J.B. Coats song \u201cThe Sweetest Gift.\u201d Emmylou Harris had joined her in studio to sing harmonies. So this seemed like the perfect song for the Trio to sing. <br\/><\/p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"jeg_video_container jeg_video_content\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Dolly Parton Linda Ronstadt Emmylou Harris   The Sweetest Gift   YouTube\" width=\"500\" height=\"375\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/H_nfoOcrqa8?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p><br\/>The Trio also performed the old Carter Family classic \u201cBury Me Under The Weeping Willow.\u201d <br\/><\/p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"jeg_video_container jeg_video_content\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Dolly Sings The Carter Family Classic &quot;Bury Me Under The Weeping Willow&quot; (1976) Feat Emmylou &amp; Linda\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/yn55-xvyBh0?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p><br\/>The collaboration went so well, the three women resolved to make an album together ASAP, despite the scheduling difficulties. They were actually able to record nearly an album\u2019s worth of material in the coming years with Emmylou\u2019s husband at the time, Brian Ahern, acting as producer. But since all three of them were on separate record labels, logistical snafus dogged the project. <\/p><p>Some of the songs from the sessions did see the light of day though. The songs \u201cMr. Sandman\u201d and \u201cEvangeline\u201d ended up appearing on Emmylou\u2019s 1981 album, with \u201cEvangeline\u201d becoming the title track. \u201cMy Blue Tears\u201d written by Dolly, and featuring all three was also released on Linda Ronstadt\u2019s 1982 album <em>Get Closer<\/em>. <\/p><p>It would be a decade after that first collaboration on the <em>Dolly!<\/em> TV show that a proper <em>Trio<\/em> album would come about. But it was worth the wait, with both the album, and the Trio supergroup going down as one of the greatest collaborations in country music history.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u2013 \u2013 \u2013 \u2013 \u2013 \u2013 \u2013 \u2013 \u2013 \u2013 \u2013<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>If you found this article valuable, consider leaving<\/em><strong><em>\u00a0<a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/tiptopjar.com\/trigger\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Saving Country Music A TIP<\/a>.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n<!-- PRyC WP: Add custom content to bottom of post\/page: Standard Content START --><\/div>\r\n<p><em> \u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\r\n<p><em> \u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source savingcountrymusic.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\r\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>About the only thing that could possibly ever top the beauty and majesty of the voices of Dolly Parton, Linda Ronstadt, and Emmylou Harris, is all three of them together. Their 1987 album\u00a0Trio\u00a0is considered one of the crowning achievements in country music history. Just like country music\u2019s other major supergroup The Highwaymen, it wasn\u2019t just [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2392167,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25179],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2392166","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-music"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/50-Years-Ago-Dolly-Emmylou-and-Linda-Debut-New-Supergroup.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2392166","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2392166"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2392166\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2392168,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2392166\/revisions\/2392168"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2392167"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2392166"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2392166"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2392166"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}