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Song of the Day #6,642: ‘Highlight of My Life’ – Dolly Parton

Three years and four solo albums (along with four more recorded with Porter Wagoner) separate my latest Dolly Parton featured record, Jolene, from my last. This woman was frighteningly prolific.

Those solo albums included one called My Favorite Songwriter, Porter Wagoner, on which Dolly performed songs written by her frequent musical partner, and another called My Tennessee Mountain Home, which dived deep into her autobiography (the liner notes included messages from her parents and a photo of the cabin where she grew up).

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Song of the Day #6,641: ‘Traveling Man’ – Dolly Parton

The next Dolly Parton album I’m covering is her eighth, and one of her most beloved: 1971’s Coat of Many Colors.

This album was released just four years after her debut, meaning Parton was churning out an average of two solo albums per year. In fact, Coat of Many Colors was her third solo 1971 release. Adding to the insanity of those numbers is the fact that she released six (yes, six!) albums with Porter Wagoner during the same span.

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Song of the Day #6,640: ‘Something Fishy’ – Dolly Parton

We lost Dolly Parton a month ago, in one of those increasingly rare pop culture moments that transcends divisions and unites us all in gratitude and sorrow.

It’s impossible not to love and admire Dolly Parton, a woman who dedicated her life to making the world a better place.

Just one of the many ways Parton did that was through her music. She released more than 49 solo albums, and dozens of live, collaborative, or soundtrack efforts. It is estimated she wrote more than 3,000 songs in her lifetime.

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Song of the Day #6,639: ‘Stuck with You’ – Huey Lewis and the News

Huey Lewis and the News held the top spot of the Billboard Hot 100 the week of September 27, 1986, with ‘Stuck with You,’ the first single from the band’s fourth album, Fore!

The band scored their first #1 hit a year earlier with previous single ‘The Power of Love,’ featured on the Back to the Future soundtrack. Their third, and final, chart-topper was ‘Jacob’s Ladder,’ the third single from Fore!

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Song of the Day #6,638: ‘A Fifth of Beethoven’ – Walter Murphy

Throwing back to the week of September 26, 1976, we find two splendid only-in-the-70s tracks atop the Billboard Hot 100: Wild Cherry’s ‘Play That Funky Music‘ and England Dan and John Ford Coley’s ‘I’d Really Love to See You Tonight.’

As both have been featured already, that brings us to #3, Walter Murphy’s disco take on one of the world’s best-known classical pieces: ‘A Fifth of Beethoven.’

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