Dolly Parton has played many a venue during a career that stretches back to the 1960s. But one stop the country music legend has never made is Tanglewood, the Berkshire County summer music festival — until now.
On June 17 at 7 p.m, Parton will open Tanglewood’s 2016 season with her first appearance there, and she’ll do it as part of her biggest North American tour in years, one that’s a showcase for an upcoming double album, “Pure & Simple with Dolly’s Biggest Hits,” that pairs new material with some of her best-known songs.
Parton’s show will open the door to a full range of music at the Lenox festival, from numerous other pop and jazz performers — Brian Wilson, Jackson Browne, James Taylor, Chick Corea and Earth, Wind & Fire — as well as classical music with the Boston Symphony Orchestra and many guest performers.
In a recent phone interview, Parton, who turned 70 in January, said she’s undertaking her longest North American tour in 25 years, starting this month and running into December. The timing seemed right, she said, given the popularity of last year’s TV movie about her early life, “Dolly Parton’s Coat of Many Colors,” and the fact she’d written a batch of new songs.
And after she’d toured extensively in 2014 in Europe, Australia and parts of the United States for her previous album, “Blue Smoke,” Parton said a lot of U.S. promoters and fans were saying, “ ‘Why don’t you do it here?’ so I said, ‘OK, why not?’ ”
Her new tunes, she said, are all love songs, and she’s singing some of them on the new tour, along with her standards like “Jolene,” “Two Doors Down,” “I’ll Always Love You” and “9 to 5.” But the show will also include “our little gospel thing and our corny jokes,” she said with a laugh. “I think there’ll be something for everybody.”
She’s also promising a stripped-down concert, with her four-member band trading off on instruments and dispensing with videos or any extras. “It’s pretty much scaled down — not a lot of loud music,” she said.
Parton, a prolific songwriter who began her career in Nashville, Tennessee, in 1964, at age 18, is the most successful female country performer in history, with 25 No. 1 hits on the Billboard Country charts and numerous awards; she’s received 46 Grammy nominations alone. She’s also starred in several movies, including “9 to 5” and “Steel Magnolias.”
At this point in her life, she said, she’s also aware of the passage of time. She was heartbroken when another country music titan, Merle Haggard, died in April; she recalled him as “a wonderful person and a dear friend.
“We worked together years ago when we were coming up,” she said. “We used to ride along on each other’s buses when we were traveling, singing songs. … We always said we were gonna write and sing an album together, and I wish we had. But his music will live forever and ever.”
Parton’s appearance on June 17, a Friday, will usher in shows by several other longtime pop music performers. On June 18 at 7 p.m., Earth, Wind & Fire, which has incorporated multiple genres over the years — R&B, funk, soul, jazz, disco and others — comes to Tanglewood. Though the group has gone through many personnel changes since forming in the 1970s, its adaptation of different styles “changed the sound of black pop,” Rolling Stone magazine wrote a few years ago.
On June 19 at 2:30 p.m., Brian Wilson, the mastermind of the Beach Boys, will make his first solo appearance at Tanglewood as he and his band perform the entirety of “Pet Sounds,” the 1966 Beach Boys album that’s considered one the most influential pop records of all time; it inspired the Beatles to issue “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” a year later.
Wilson has been getting increased attention and acclaim in recent years, particularly following the release of the 2014 biopic “Love & Mercy.” He announced earlier this year that the extensive “Pet Sounds” tour, which has already touched down in Australia, Japan and Great Britain, will be his last for the record, which is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year.
Following Wilson will be veteran singer-songwriter Jackson Browne, who comes to Tanglewood June 21 at 7 p.m. Browne, whose many hits include “Doctor My Eyes,” Running on Empty,” “These Days” and “The Pretender,” has a new album out, “Standing in the Breach,” on which Rolling Stone says he “makes an eloquent case” for the role of the artist who imagines a better world.
On the July 4th weekend, Berkshire County’s own, James Taylor, plays two shows with his band. Other acts this summer include Bob Dylan, the Chick Corea Trio, roots-rockers Train, and the Boston Pops, which will play a number of shows, including one on Sept. 2 with the B-52s.
There’s also a slot for one of America’s most noted raconteurs: Garrison Keillor and his various friends and guests bring “A Prairie Home Companion” to the festival June 25, marking the 19th consecutive year the show will be broadcast live from Tanglewood.
In addition, there will be no shortage of classical music at Tanglewood, which is the summer home of the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Led by director Andris Nelsons, the BSO plays numerous concerts, both with guest soloists and conductors; the festival also offers performances by other ensembles and some specialized shows.
For example, on July 6, members of BSO’s brass and percussion sections will join forces with several of America’s leading drum-and-bugle corps, such as the Boston Crusaders and the Bluecoats (out of Canton, Ohio), for the “Brass Spectacular.” Festival organizers say the concert was first featured last year and proved to be tremendously popular.
And on August 14, Australian entertainer Barry Humphries — better known by the character and stage name Dame Edna Everage — leads the Australian Chamber Orchestra in a performance of the “degenerate” music of Berlin’s Weimar Republic, including jazz, cabaret, tango and Broadway-musical style pieces. The hedonistic partying and social revolution of the era is re-awakened through the music of Kurt Weill and others; one feature is the “transgressive cabaret sensation” Meow Meow.
Along more conventional classical music lines, the long list of soloists and guest performers with the BSO this summer includes pianist Dejan Lazić, violinist Lisa Batiashvili, conductor Juanjo Mena, and cellist Yo-Yo Ma. The latter plays Aug. 7 with the Silk Road Ensemble, an eclectic group of musicians from 20 countries, and Aug. 27 with the BSO.
Another guest artist is operatic soprano Kristine Opolais, who’s married to Nelsons, the BSO music director. She’ll sing the lead role of Aida on Aug. 20 in the first two acts of the Verdi opera of the same name, while her husband leads the BSO in backing the singers.
Steve Pfarrer can be reached at spfarrer@gazettenet.com.
For information about Tanglewood events and ticket prices, visit www.tanglewood.org.