In 2012, Dolly Parton co-starred with Kris Kristofferson, Queen Latifah, and Keke Palmer in the musical drama Joyful Noise. Parton also wrote the music for the film, and on the soundtrack, she recorded a duet with Kristofferson. “From Here to the Moon and Back,” A year later, Parton rerecorded it with Willie Nelson a year later for his 2013 album To All the Girls…, a nod to his 1982 No. 1 hit with Julio Iglesias “To All the Girls I’ve Loved Before.”
“I love Willie,” said Parton of their collaboration. “I love that old funky sound he gets on that guitar. But he’s very hard to sing with because of his phrasing. It was like an exercise of some sort, like trying to catch him with all his little phrases and all. But it was a joy, and I’m glad we did it.”
Nelson’s album, which also features duets with Loretta Lynn, Mavis Staples, Rosanne Cash, Emmylou Harris, Sheryl Crow, Alison Krauss, Carrie Underwood, and Miranda Lambert, marked the third duet for him and Parton.
In 2020, they reunited with Parton, pulling a Nelson classic with his 1963 hit “Pretty Paper” for her album A Holly Dolly Christmas. Written by Nelson in 1963, “Pretty Paper” became a hit for Roy Orbison in 1964 and tells the story of a disabled man that Nelson would often see selling ribbons and paper on the sidewalk in Fort Worth, Texas, who would shout “pretty paper” to grab the attention of passersby.
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[RELATED: 2 Songs Dolly Parton Wrote for Merle Haggard (1968-1976)]
‘The Winning Hand’
Decades before “From Here to the Moon and Back,” and their rendition of “Pretty Paper,” Parton and Nelson shared their first duets in 1982, which were part of a collaborative album with Kristofferson and Brenda Lee, The Winning Hand.
Their first of two, “Everything’s Beautiful (In Its Own Way),” was written by Parton and sung as a duet with Nelson. Released on November 8, 1982, the ballad went to No. 7 on the Country chart.
On the album, Parton and Nelson’s second duet is a cover of the Tune Weavers’ hit “Happy, Happy Birthday, Baby.” Before her duet with Nelson, Parton covered “Happy, Happy Birthday Baby” decades earlier when she was 19, just after signing with Monument Records in 1965.
When it was originally released in 1957, the song went to No. 5 on the Billboard Hot 100 and peaked at No. 4 on the R&B chart. and was initially written by the Tune Weavers’ Margo Sylvia (1936-1991) following her breakup with then-boyfriend Donald Clemens from the group the Sophomores.
“The words came so easily,” said Sylvia in The Billboard Book of One-Hit Wonders, released a year before she died in 1990. “It was real.”
Photo: Bob D’Amico/Disney General Entertainment Content via Getty Images
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