Country Singer Porter Wagoner Dies at 80

from National Public Radio

Celebrated country singer Porter Wagoner has died. He was 80.

Wagoner had been hospitalized for lung cancer.

He joined Nashville's Grand Ole Opry in 1957. Ten years later he hired Dolly Parton, then 21 years old, as his duet partner.

Wagoner was known as much for his wardrobe as his music. According to the Opry's Web site: it only took a flash of the lining of one of Wagoner's famously splendiferous, eye-boggling suits and a few of his well-timed lines for any Opry audience to feel right at home.

Broadcast Dates

• Morning Edition, October 29, 2007