Dolly Parton’s Heartbreaking Memory of Standing Next to Patsy Cline at the Opry

Although the latter country star’s tragically premature death often places these two women in separate eras of country music, there was a time when Dolly Parton and Patsy Cline walked the hallowed grounds of the Grand Ole Opry at the same time. Cline was 14 years Parton’s senior, but after Parton made her Opry debut in 1959, the two became musical peers of sorts.

It was during this brief window of time that Parton made a heartbreaking but enduring memory of standing with Cline in the wings of the historic Nashville venue.

Dolly Parton’s Heartbreaking Memory of Patsy Cline

In honor of her 50th anniversary of being a Grand Ole Opry member, Dolly Parton spoke to The Tennessean in 2019 about her most memorable moments at the Opry, one of which involved the late country star Patsy Cline. “I remember standing in the winds watching all these incredible artists, people with big names, the biggest people,” Parton recalled. “You know, from Hank Snow, Webb Pierce, you see, I go back. All the way back.”

“I remember seeing Patsy Cline,” she continued. “It was after she had had a car wreck. I remember, as a child, thinking there was this really big, deep scar between her eyebrows. I remember seeing her before she had that. And I remember thinking about how awful that was that she got her pretty face scarred up like that. It didn’t hurt her singing any. But I just felt sorry and sad thinking about her nearly getting killed in a wreck and how she wound up dying anyway.”

“I just remember looking at her and seeing that, and then her walking to the microphone and her starting to sing, and then nothing else registered besides her God-given voice.”

The Late Country Star Recorded “Crazy” Around This Time

While Dolly Parton didn’t clarify the month or year she stood in the wings with Patsy Cline, we know it was after June 14, 1961, the day the late country star and her brother, Sam, were in a head-on collision in Nashville. Cline sustained serious injuries, including the gash on her forehead that produced the scar Parton talked about, a dislocated hip, and a fractured wrist. Doctors estimated Cline would need to be in the hospital for two months.

Cline had other plans. In the second month of what should have been her two-month recovery window, the “Walkin’ After Midnight” singer entered the studio on crutches to cut her vocals for “Crazy,” which would become one of her most iconic recordings. She had already tried to track her vocals in the studio once before but cut the session short, citing an inability to perform to her standards. A few days later, Cline returned and tracked her part in one take.

After recording “Crazy,” Cline continued to perform in concerts, on television, and on the Grand Ole Opry stage. She tried to use hairpieces and headbands to cover her prominent forehead scar, but of course, the curious eyes of a teenager like Dolly Parton were liable to catch almost anything amiss. Cline’s highly influential career came to a tragic end a couple of years later when her plane crashed on March 5, 1963, outside the small, rural town of Camden, Tennessee.

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