The country icon also expressed interest in performing the song at the next Grammy Awards with Beyoncé

Dolly Parton and Beyoncé. CREDIT: Jon Morgan/CBS via Getty Images (left), Kevin Mazur/Getty Images for iHeartRadio (right)

Dolly Parton has revealed she was surprised that Beyoncé’s cover of her seminal song ‘Jolene’ featured different lyrics.

In an interview with E! News, Parton said “it was very bold” of Beyoncé to give her 1973 song a new spin on her latest album ‘Cowboy Carter’. “When they said she was gonna do ‘Jolene,’ I expected it to be my regular one, but it wasn’t,” Parton said.

“But I love what she did to it. And as a songwriter, you love the fact that people do your songs no matter how they do them.”

She expressed her admiration for Beyoncé’s reworked lyrics: “She wasn’t gonna go beg some other woman like I did. ‘Don’t steal my man.’ ‘Shit, get out here, bitch. You ain’t stealin’ mine.’” Watch the interview clip below.

Parton added that she thought Beyoncé “did a great job in country music”, and she was “happy” she did ‘Jolene’. “I, of course, would have loved to have heard how she would have done it in its original way. But of course, you know, it’s Beyoncé,” she surmised. “Yeah, her life is different than mine.”

The country veteran guested on ‘Cowboy Carter’ track ‘Tyrant’, along with interlude ‘Dolly P’, which features a message recorded by Parton that leads into the ‘Jolene’ cover.

Beyoncé – ‘Cowboy Carter’ review: country reinvention strikes gold

Ms Carter unlocks yet another infinity stone with a heartfelt, expansive take on country music

At this stage of her career, it’d feel pretty redundant to try and put labels on what Beyoncé Knowles-Carter can and cannot do. In the eight years since her performance with The Chicks at the Country Music Awards drew ire from critics who felt she didn’t ‘belong’, she has brought Black college culture to Coachella, showcased the African diaspora in Disney, and turned both personal and societal hardships into disco-dancing lemonade, platforming LGBTQ+ ballroom and house music.

Her eighth album is another exercise in reclamation and celebration. It’s also deeply personal; where ‘Renaissance’ paid tribute to her Uncle Johnny – a late relative Beyoncé described as “my godmother” – ‘Cowboy Carter’ appears to dig deeper into her Texan/Louisiana-Creole lineage, the Beyoncé family tree and her mother’s maiden name. Doused in her signature blend of eclectic herbs and spices, ‘Cowboy Carter’ is not a straight country album – it also incorporates the blues, funk, folk, soul, opera and gritty southern rap.

The production alone is noteworthy, painting a portrait of richness and precision that highlights Beyoncé’s peerless vocal range. ‘American Requiem’ is a bold, Broadway musical of an opener, with deep vocal squeals and psychedelic nylon guitars framing her thematic frustration: “They used to say I spoke too country / Said I wasn’t country enough / But if that ain’t country, tell me, what is?”

Her cover of The Beatles ‘Blackbird’ is a fairly faithful recreation, but draws all of its power from its symbolism. Here is a poignant civil rights anthem – written by Paul McCartney in 1968 and inspired by the Little Rock Nine – that is shared and sung beautifully with rising Black female stars of country: Tanner Adell, Brittney Spencer, Tiera Kennedy and Reyna Roberts.

By the time we get to the cool road-trip breeze of ‘Bodyguard’, the boot-scooting fun really kicks in. Introduced by ‘Dolly P’ herself, ‘Jolene’ reframes a classic, promising heat if Miss J even thinks about stepping to her man. A warning rather than a lament, it trades away some of the visceral agony of the original, but is a playful addition to ‘Becky with the good hair’ lore, outing Yoncé as a “Creole banjee bitch from Louisianne.” Jay-Z would do well to avert his own eyes during ‘Levii’s Jeans’, a raunchy duet with Post Malone that recalls the sherbet sunsets of ’70s radio rock.

‘Spaghetti’ meanwhile, is served deliciously al dente, a trap-rap shoot-‘em-up that goes spur-to-spur with rising country rapper Shaboozey. It also offers our first album introduction to Linda Martell, the legendary country star who was the first Black woman to play the Grand Ole Opry, a radio broadcast that is a stalwart of the US country scene; “Genres are a funny little concept, ain’t they?” she teases.