The performance fulfilled a prediction Parton had made more than twelve years earlier. But it wasn’t the song she said she wanted at her own funeral. For that, she had a different choice: a gospel hymn tied to her father, Robert Lee Parton, and a family memory she cherished.
The contrast between the two songs offers a glimpse of the difference between the Dolly Parton the world knew and the daughter who remembered her father.
On Wednesday, October 21, 2026, the Country Music Association brought more than 20 performers together at Belmont University’s Fisher Center for the Performing Arts in Nashville for CMA Presents I Will Always Love You: A Celebration of Dolly Parton.
The two-hour television special honored Parton nearly two months after her death on August 25, at age 80.
At the close of the evening, Vince Gill introduced Carrie Underwood. Wearing a flowing white gown decorated with butterflies—one of Parton’s favorite symbols—Underwood stood alone before a large black-and-white portrait of the country legend and began singing “I Will Always Love You.”
As the song reached its final chorus, Reba McEntire, Vince Gill, Brad Paisley, Lainey Wilson, Ella Langley, and other performers joined Underwood onstage. Their voices carried the closing lines together. The audience responded with a standing ovation.
It was a fitting end to a public celebration of Parton’s life and music. The song, after all, was not just one of her best-known compositions. Parton had once imagined it being played when she was gone.
In February 2012, Whitney Houston died at age 48. At her funeral, Houston’s recording of “I Will Always Love You” played as pallbearers carried her coffin from the church.
The moment affected Parton deeply. The song had begun as her own farewell to country singer Porter Wagoner, who had helped launch her national career. Released in 1974, Parton’s version became one of her signature recordings. Houston’s 1992 recording later introduced it to a new generation and became an international hit.
Parton reflected on the song’s place in Houston’s farewell in a 2014 interview with Entertainment Weekly. Asked what music she would want at her own funeral, she predicted: “I’m sure they’ll be playing ‘I Will Always Love You’ when I die, just like they did with Whitney Houston.”
The October 2026 tribute gave that prediction a striking echo. Underwood’s performance made the song a public farewell to Parton, just as Houston’s recording had been part of her own final tribute.
But Parton had more to say about the music she personally hoped to hear.
The song Parton named was “If We Never Meet Again,” a country-gospel hymn about separation, faith, and the hope of meeting loved ones again beyond this life.
Its importance to Parton was personal. The hymn had been a favorite of her father, Robert Lee Parton, and the family sang it at his funeral.
In the same Entertainment Weekly interview, Parton explained her choice simply: “That was my daddy’s favorite.”
She said she hoped the hymn would be sung at her own funeral, too. It was not a choice based on fame or the size of a song’s audience. It was rooted in family, faith, and a memory of her father.
Whether “If We Never Meet Again” was sung at Parton’s private family service has not been publicly established. The CMA’s televised tribute was a separate event: a public celebration of her life and work, not a report of what took place at her funeral.
The two songs tell different stories.
“I Will Always Love You” was Parton’s farewell to Wagoner, then became a defining song in her own catalog and, through Houston, a landmark recording in popular music. Its words and melody reached far beyond the original parting that inspired it. By the time Underwood sang it in Nashville, it had become a song audiences could associate with saying goodbye to Parton herself.
“If We Never Meet Again” belonged to a quieter, more intimate part of Parton’s life. Its meaning came from her family’s faith and from the memory of her father. The hymn was not the song the world was most likely to recognize, but it was the one Parton connected with a deeply personal wish.
That difference gives Underwood’s performance added resonance. Nashville chose the song millions knew, while Parton had also revealed the song she wanted because of what it meant to her family.
At the end of the CMA celebration, Underwood began “I Will Always Love You” alone, before Parton’s portrait. Fellow performers joined her for the final chorus, turning a solitary performance into a communal goodbye.
More than twelve years earlier, Parton had imagined that her most famous song might be played after her death. The Nashville tribute brought that prediction to life.
But behind the iconic farewell was another song: “If We Never Meet Again,” a hymn that carried the memory of Parton’s father. One belonged to the world that sang along with Dolly Parton; the other belonged to the family story she held close.