Beyoncé‘s mom, Tina Knowles, is debunking a post that purportedly saw her shading Dolly Parton for her response to Bey being snubbed from the 2024 Country Music Awards.
As previously reported, Bey was not nominated for anything at the CMAs this year, despite her chart-topping country album Cowboy Carter.
While her father blamed it on her race, Dolly offered up her own opinion in a conversation with Variety published on Tuesday (September 17).
“There’s so many wonderful country artists that, I guess probably the country music field, they probably thought, well, we can’t really leave out some of the ones that spend their whole life doing that,” Parton said. “But I didn’t even realize [Beyoncé wasn’t nominated] until somebody asked me that question. But it was a wonderful album. She can be very, very proud of, and I think everybody in country music welcomed her and thought that, that was good.”
The legendary Country star went on: “So I don’t think it was a matter of shutting out, like doing that on purpose. I think it was just more of what the country charts and the country artists were doing, that do that all the time, not just a specialty album.”
Bey covered Parton’s smash single “Jolene” on Cowboy Carter, with Dolly later saying she’d be open to doing a duet of it.
A screenshot of a comment from Ms. Tina went viral soon after, in which she allegedly responded to Dolly’s comments.
“Oh Ms. Dolly, we love you, but Bey did spend her WHOLE life workin’ hard, since she was 9!” the post read. “She got country roots too. She’s mastered her craft and broken records in EVERY genre. So sayin’ she didn’t ‘spend her life’ in country music dismisses all that work she put in.”
It went on: “Bey don’t need to stay in one lane to get respect – her talent and work ethic speak for themselves! She’s been puttin’ in the work, and nobody else gets asked to ‘spend their life’ in one place to be recognized! #beencountry.”
However, when it was shared by The Neighborhood Talk, Ms. Tina confirmed: “This is fake not from me!”
Mathew Knowles spoke to TMZ earlier this month after the CMAs nominees were announced with no Beyoncé in sight.
Knowles says he’s not surprised about the snub, noting that Bey wasn’t met with a warm welcome when she performed with the Dixie Chicks at the 2016 CMAs and that she’s yet to receive an apology for it.
“[The voters are] showing it still comes down to white and Black,” he told the outlet. “There’s more white people in America and unfortunately they don’t vote based on ability and achievements, it’s still sometimes a white and Black thing.”
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He concluded: “In America, there’s no accountability for people not being accepting of other cultures.”
The nominations for the Country Music Awards were announced on September 9. Though Bey didn’t get any, Shaboozey, who first came to the attention of many with his two appearances on Cowboy Carter, was nominated for Single of the Year for “A Bar Song (Tipsy).”
“Thank you Beyoncé for opening a door for us, starting a conversation, and giving us one of the most innovative country albums of all time!” he wrote on X as the news broke.
