
Reba McEntire
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Reba McEntire Biography
Reba McEntire was the most successful female recording artist
in country music in the 1980s and 1990s, during which time she scored
22 number one hits and released five gold albums, six platinum albums,
two double-platinum albums, four triple-platinum albums, a
quadruple-platinum album, and a quintuple-platinum album, for certified
album sales of 33.5 million over the 20-year period. While she
continued to sell records in healthy numbers into the 21st century, she
expanded her activities as an actress in film and on the legitimate
stage, and particularly on television, where she starred in a
long-running situation comedy. Such diversification made her the
greatest crossover star to emerge from country music since Dolly Parton.
Reba Nell McEntire was born March 28, 1955, in McAlester, OK, the
second daughter and third of four children of Clark Vincent McEntire, a
professional steer roper, and Jacqueline (Smith) McEntire, a former
school teacher. Her older brother Del Stanley ( Pake ) McEntire also
became a country singer, while her younger sister Martha Susan
( Susie ) McEntire Luchsinger became a gospel singer. McEntire was
raised on the 7,000-acre family ranch in Chockie, OK, traveling with
her parents and siblings to the rodeos at which her father competed.
Clark McEntire was named World Champion Steer Roper three times, in
1957, 1958, and 1961. (McEntire's grandfather, John McEntire, had won
the same title in 1934.) McEntire's mother had aspired to a career in
music but never pursued it. She encouraged her children to sing and
taught them songs and harmony during the long car trips between rodeos.
Alice McEntire, the oldest child, did not actively seek a musical
career, but the other three were members of a country group, the Kiowa
High School Cowboy Band, as early as 1969, when McEntire began
attending Kiowa High School in Kiowa, OK. She also entered local talent
contests on her own. In 1971, the Kiowa High School Cowboy Band
recorded a single, The Ballad of John McEntire, for the tiny Boss
Records label, which pressed 1,000 copies. As the early '70s went on,
the band gave way to a trio, the Singing McEntires, consisting of the
three siblings, which performed at rodeos. McEntire also followed in
the family tradition of competing, becoming a barrel racer, the only
rodeo event open to women.
McEntire graduated from high school in June 1973 and enrolled at
Southeastern Oklahoma State University. While attending the National
Rodeo Finals in Oklahoma City on December 10, 1974, she sang the
national anthem on network television. Also present at the rodeo was
country star Red Steagall, who was impressed by her voice and asked her
to go to Nashville to record some demos for his song publishing
company. After she did so in March 1975 during her spring break from
college, he took the tapes around town trying to get her a record deal
and succeeded with Mercury Records, which signed her to a contract on
November 11, 1975, that called for her to record two singles for the
label. On January 22, 1976, she entered a Nashville recording studio
and cut the first of those singles, I Don't Want to Be a One Night
Stand, which, upon its release, climbed to number 88 in the Billboard
country singles chart in May. On June 21, 1976, she married Charlie
Battles, a champion steer wrestler she had met at a rodeo. Battles
later became her business manager.
On September 16, 1976, McEntire did her second Mercury recording
session, which produced her second single, (There's Nothing Like the
Love) Between a Woman and a Man. It peaked at number 86 in March 1977.
In the meantime, on December 16, 1976, she graduated from college on an
accelerated three-and-a-half-year program with a major in elementary
education and a minor in music, freeing her to pursue her career
full-time. Her record label, however, seemed in no particular hurry,
although it picked up her option for further recordings. Her third
single, Glad I Waited Just for You, recorded on April 13, 1977,
peaked at number 88 in August, the same month Mercury released her
debut album, Reba McEntire, which did not chart. On September 17, 1977,
she made her debut at the Grand Ole Opry.
Two and a half years into her recording career, with very little to
show for it, McEntire was paired with labelmate Jacky Ward for the
two-sided single Three Sheets in the Wind / I'd Really Love to See You
Tonight (the B-side a cover of the pop hit by England Dan & John
Ford Coley), which reached number 20 in July 1978. That and her touring
as an opening act for Steagall, Ward, and others increased her
exposure, and her next solo single, Last Night, Ev'ry Night, reached
number 28 in October, beginning a string of singles that made it at
least into the country Top 40. She first got into the Top 20 with her
cover of the Patsy Cline hit Sweet Dreams, which peaked at number 19
in November 1979. She still wasn't selling any albums, however; her
second LP, Out of a Dream, released in September 1979, did not chart.
McEntire continued to make strides on the singles chart, reaching the
Top Ten for the first time with (You Lift Me) Up to Heaven, which
peaked at number eight in August 1980. Feel the Fire, her third album,
released in October 1980, was another failure, but after a couple more
Top 20 singles she reached the Top Five with Today All Over Again in
October 1981. The song was featured on her fourth album, Heart to
Heart, released in September, which helped it become her first to
chart, reaching number 42 in the country LP list. She achieved a new
high on the singles chart in August 1982 when I'm Not That Lonely Yet
reached number three. It was included on her fifth album, Unlimited,
released in June 1982, which hit number 22. But that was only the
beginning. The LP also spawned Can't Even Get the Blues and You're
the First Time I've Thought About Leaving, which became back-to-back
number one hits in January and April 1983. By then, she had moved up
from playing nightclubs and honky tonks to being the regular opening
act for the Statler Brothers. She went on to work in the same capacity
with Conway Twitty, Ronnie Milsap, Mickey Gilley, and others.
It might be argued that Mercury Records had taken a 20-year-old
neophyte singing the national anthem at a rodeo and, over a period of
more than seven years, groomed her until she became a chart-topping
country star. McEntire appears not to have viewed things that way,
however. On the contrary, she seems to have been unhappy with the songs
the label gave her to sing and the musical approach taken on her
records, feeling that she was being pushed too much in a country-pop
direction. She also has criticized Mercury's promotional efforts on her
behalf. And, despite her recent success, the long years of development
meant she was nowhere near repaying the investment Mercury had made in
her, which, of course, was charged against her potential royalties on
the company books. (Although she received yearly advances from the
label, she later said that she did not see her first royalties from
Mercury until 1988.) So, she sought a release from her contract and,
after cutting one more album for Mercury, her sixth LP, Behind the
Scene, released in September 1983, she signed to MCA Records, her new
contract taking effect on October 1, 1983. The first fruits of the
switchover suggested that not much had changed. Her debut MCA single,
Just a Little Love, was a Top Five hit in June 1984, shortly after
the release of an album of the same name, but that LP was actually less
successful than Unlimited.
McEntire took strong action. Set to have Harold Shedd (Alabama's
producer, and thus a hot commercial property) produce her next album,
she rejected his suggestions for songs and the sweetened arrangements
he imposed on them and appealed to Jimmy Bowen, the newly installed
president of MCA's country division. Bowen allowed her to pick her own
material and to eliminate the strings and other pop touches used on
Just a Little Love and her Mercury releases. The result was the
pointedly titled My Kind of Country, released in November 1984, which
was dominated by covers of old country songs previously performed by
Ray Price, Carl Smith, Connie Smith, and Faron Young. Even before the
album's release, however, and before its advance single, How Blue,
hit number one, McEntire was named Female Vocalist of the Year by the
Country Music Association (CMA) on October 8, 1984. It was a surprising
win; Dolly Parton, Barbara Mandrell, and Charly McClain had all
arguably been more successful during the previous 12 months. But it was
a forward-looking recognition for a performer who was wisely aligning
herself with such artists as Ricky Skaggs and George Strait as a new
traditionalist, moving country music back to its roots after the
decline of the pop-country Urban Cowboy phenomenon of the early '80s.
How Blue hit number one in January 1985, followed by the second
single from My Kind of Country, Somebody Should Leave, which topped
the chart in May as the album reached number 13. (Eventually, it was
certified gold.) With such success, McEntire was able to start
headlining her own concerts. For her next album, Have I Got a Deal for
You, released in July 1985, she worked directly with Bowen, the two
billed as co-producers. Another new traditionalist collection, it
included her own composition Only in My Mind, a Top Five hit, as well
as a Top Ten hit in the title song; though the LP was not as successful
as its predecessor, it too went gold over time, and it helped McEntire
earn her second consecutive CMA award as Female Vocalist of the Year.
Another important accolade came on January 14, 1986, when she became a
member of the Grand Ole Opry.
Perhaps even more important than McEntire's decision to perform music
in a more traditional country style was her search for material that
she felt women would respond to. Just as Loretta Lynn had spoken for
pre-feminist women in the 1960s, McEntire had begun to address the
emotional and empowering concerns of women in the 1980s. Whoever's in
New England, her next single, released in January 1986 just ahead of
an album of the same name, was a case in point. Kendal Franceschi and
Quentin Powers' song was written in the voice of a Southern woman who
believes her husband is having an affair during his business trips up
north, but pledges that she will remain available to him when
whoever's in New England's through with you. It was a career-making
song for McEntire, not least because it was promoted by her first music
video. Reaching number one in May 1986, it marked a major breakthrough
for her, beginning a string of chart-topping hits that didn't begin to
slow down for the next three years. Little Rock, the follow-up
single, also hit number one, as did the Whoever's in New England album,
her first LP to be certified gold. (It later went platinum.)
Her career in high gear, McEntire released her next album, What Am I
Gonna Do About You, in September 1986, prefaced by a single of the same
name that hit number one, as did the gold-selling LP, which also
featured the chart-topping single One Promise Too Late. On October
13, 1986, McEntire not only won her third consecutive Female Vocalist
of the Year Award from the CMA, but also was named Entertainer of the
Year. On February 24, 1987, she won her first Grammy Award for Country
Female Vocal for Whoever's in New England. She released Reba
McEntire's Greatest Hits in April; it became her first platinum album
and eventually sold over three million copies. (It also became her
first album ever to cross over to the pop charts.) On June 25, 1987,
she filed for divorce from Charlie Battles, her husband of 11 years.
After her divorce was settled and Battles was awarded the couple's
ranch in Oklahoma, she moved to Nashville.
McEntire's string of hits continued with the release of The Last One to
Know in September 1987, prefaced by a single of the same name that
reached number one in December. The album, also featuring the number
one hit Love Will Find Its Way to You, reached number three and
eventually went platinum. McEntire won an unprecedented fourth straight
CMA award as Female Vocalist of the Year in October. In November, she
released a holiday album, Merry Christmas to You, which, over the
years, sold more than two million copies. She engendered controversy
with her next album release, Reba, which appeared in May 1988. Here, an
artist who had jumped on the new traditionalist bandwagon in 1984
abruptly jumped off, returning to more of a pop-oriented style, without
a fiddle or a steel guitar anywhere. The album's lead-off single was
Sunday Kind of Love, a cover of the 1947 Jo Stafford pop hit. It
peaked at number five in July, actually the worst showing for a
McEntire single in nearly three years. But the album had already begun
a run of eight weeks at number one by then, and it was supported by the
subsequent chart-topping singles I Know How He Feels and New Fool at
an Old Game. It eventually went platinum. Also in 1988, McEntire
founded Starstruck Entertainment, a company that handled management,
booking, publishing, and other aspects of her career and, eventually,
represented other artists as well.
Sweet Sixteen, released in May 1989, was actually McEntire's 14th
regular studio album, but her 16th counting her authorized MCA hits
compilation and Christmas album. The lead-off single was a cover of the
Everly Brothers' Cathy's Clown that hit number one in July, and it
was followed by three Top Ten hits, 'Til Love Comes Again, Little
Girl, and Walk On, as the LP spent 13 weeks at the top of the
charts, with sales eventually crossing the million mark. It also
reached the pop Top 100. McEntire had already recorded her next album,
Live, the previous April for release in September and, though it took
more than a decade, another platinum certification. That gave her some
breathing space. On June 3, 1989, she married Narvel Blackstock, her
manager, who had been part of her organization since joining her band
as its steel guitar player in 1980. On February 23, 1990, she bore him
a son, Shelby Steven McEntire Blackstock. A month earlier, she had made
her feature film acting debut in the comic horror film Tremors, which
had been shot the previous spring.
McEntire was back on tour by May 1990, and she returned to record
making in September with her 15th regular studio album, Rumor Has It,
which was prefaced by the single You Lie, a number one hit. Three
other songs from the LP placed in the country Top Ten: the title song,
a revival of Bobbie Gentry's 1969 hit Fancy, and Fallin' Out of
Love. The album eventually sold three million copies. McEntire was on
tour promoting it when, on March 16, 1991, seven members of her band
and her road manager were killed in a plane crash after a show in San
Diego. She dedicated her next album, For My Broken Heart, to them when
it was released in October. The disc was another massive hit, going
gold and platinum simultaneously shortly after its release and
eventually selling four million copies, its singles including the
chart-topping title song and another number one, Is There Life Out
There. Also in 1991, McEntire co-starred in the TV mini-series The
Gambler Returns: The Luck of the Draw. Her 17th album, It's Your Call,
was released in December 1992, and, like Rumor Has It, it was an
immediate million seller, eventually going triple platinum. (It was
also her first Top Ten pop album.) Its biggest single was The Heart
Won't Lie, a duet with Vince Gill that hit number one in April 1993.
McEntire's next chart-topper was also a duet, Does He Love You, sung
with Linda Davis; it hit number one in November 1993 and was included
on her September release Greatest Hits, Vol. 2, an album that sold two
million copies practically out of the box and another three million
over the next five years. Does He Love You won McEntire her second
Grammy, for Best Country Collaboration with Vocals, and a CMA award for
Vocal Event. She also appeared in the TV movie The Man from Left Field
in 1993.
By 1994, while continuing to reign as country's most successful female
singer, McEntire was increasingly turning her attention to other
concerns. Her 18th regular studio album, Read My Mind, appeared in
April. Another instant million-seller that went on to go triple
platinum, it threw off five country chart singles, among them the
chart-topping The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter and, controversially, She
Thinks His Name Was John, a song about a woman who contracts AIDS from
a one-night stand. Even McEntire's star power could propel such an
atypical country subject only as high as number 15 in the charts.
Meanwhile, she had parts in two feature films released during the
summer, a speaking role in the drama North and a cameo in the
children's comedy The Little Rascals. (She also made an uncredited
appearance in the Western film Maverick and was heard on the soundtrack
album.) She executive produced and starred in a TV movie based on her
song, Is There Life Out There? And she published her autobiography,
Reba: My Story, which became a best-seller.
McEntire's 19th album was called Starting Over, released in October
1995. Intended to mark the 20th anniversary of her recording career, it
was a collection of covers of well-known songs. It not only topped the
country charts but hit number five in the pop charts, selling a million
copies out of the box. But, boasting only one Top Ten hit, a revival of
Lee Greenwood's Ring on Her Finger, Time on Her Hands, among three
chart singles, and not achieving a multi-platinum certification, it
suggested that McEntire finally had peaked commercially as far as
country music was concerned. (In a considerable departure for a country
singer, MCA released a dance remix of McEntire's revival of the
Supremes' You Keep Me Hangin' On from the album that reached number
two on Billboard's dance chart.) That didn't keep her from starring in
another TV mini-series, Buffalo Gals, playing famed Western
sharpshooter Annie Oakley, a part her rodeo background suited her to
perfectly. She bounced back on the country charts somewhat with her
20th album, What If It's You, released in November 1996. The album
spawned four Top 20 hits, with How Was I to Know reaching number one
and The Fear of Being Alone and I'd Rather Ride Around with You
each getting to number two. Simultaneously certified gold and platinum,
the album eventually topped two million copies.
The singles drawn from What If It's You kept McEntire's name in the
country charts throughout 1997, as did the holiday benefit record What
If, the proceeds from which were donated to the Salvation Army. But
for the first time since 1978, she did not release a new album, even a
compilation, during the calendar year. Aiming for a splash, she teamed
up with the popular country duo Brooks & Dunn in the spring of 1998
for a single called If You See Him/If You See Her. It hit number one
in June, helping to set up the release of her 21st album, If You See
Him, which also brought her three additional Top Ten hits on its way to
selling a million copies. She appeared in the TV movie Forever Love
(the title of one of those Top Ten hits) during the year and made
several guest-star appearances on TV series.
After publishing her second book of memoirs, Comfort from a Country
Quilt, in May 1999, McEntire had two new albums ready for the fall.
Secret of Giving: A Christmas Collection, a September release, was her
second holiday CD, which she accompanied with a TV movie, Secret of
Giving. The disc eventually went gold. So Good Together, issued in
November, was her 22nd regular studio album, prefaced by the Top Five
single What Do You Say. Although none of the songs from the album
topped the country charts, it did feature a second Top Five hit, I'll
Be, and a Top 20 hit in We're So Good Together, and it went platinum
before the end of 2000.
As in 1997, McEntire went without an album release in 2000, and in this
case, it turned out that she definitely was positioning herself for a
career beyond country music, as events in 2001 showed. In February of
that year, she stepped in as a replacement star in the Broadway revival
of Irving Berlin's musical Annie Get Your Gun that had begun
performances in 1999 with Bernadette Peters in the title role of Annie
Oakley. Barry and Fran Weissler, the producers of the revival, were
known on Broadway for making money by keeping production costs down and
by the extensive use of what was derisively called stunt casting :
bringing in a well-known personality, often one without much of a
theater background, as a replacement to extend the run of a show, as a
means of exciting the tourist crowd who would recognize the name of a
prominent TV star, for example. McEntire had been preceded as a
replacement in Annie Get Your Gun by soap opera star Susan Lucci and TV
actress Cheryl Ladd, both of whom kept the show going while being
largely ignored or derided by theater insiders. McEntire turned out to
be an entirely different proposition. First, although she lacked
legitimate theater experience, she had by now done plenty of acting on
television and even a little in film. Second, she had long since
brought unusually high production values to her concerts that included
choreography and costume changes, good preparation for similar demands
in the theater. Third, she could, of course, sing. And fourth, with her
rodeo background and Oklahoma accent, she was an ideal Annie Oakley,
just as she had been in her previous TV portrayal. (Never mind that the
real Annie Oakley was from Ohio; in everybody's mind, this female
sharpshooter and star of Buffalo Bill's Wild West show, the precursor
to the modern rodeo, was a Westerner.) The result was a triumph for
McEntire. Reviews were ecstatic, and tickets sold out. The Tony Awards
did not have a category for replacements (one has since been added),
but she was given special awards for her performance by the Drama Desk,
the Outer Critics Circle, and Theatre World. She stayed in the show
until June 22, 2001. Unfortunately, there was no new cast album
recorded to immortalize her appearance.
During the run of Annie Get Your Gun, McEntire was seen in a small part
in the film One Night a McCool's, released in April 2001. Her most
extensive filmed acting role began on October 5, 2001, however, when
the half-hour situation comedy Reba premiered on the WB TV network
(later renamed the CW network). The show became the primary focus of
McEntire's activities, and she moved to Los Angeles to accommodate it.
She had not, however, given up country music entirely. In the summer of
2001, she released a single, I'm a Survivor, that peaked in the
country Top Five and prefaced a new compilation, Greatest Hits, Vol. 3:
I'm a Survivor, released in October. It topped the country charts and
went gold.
McEntire was occupied primarily with her TV series during 2002 and
2003. She finally returned to record making after two years in the
summer of 2003 with a new single, I'm Gonna Take That Mountain, which
peaked in the country Top 20. Room to Breathe, her 23rd regular studio
album and first in three years, followed in November and went platinum
over the next nine months. The disc's second single, Somebody, hit
number one, and it was followed by another Top Ten hit, He Gets That
from Me, and the Top 20 My Sister.
Reba continued on into 2004 and 2005. McEntire found time in the spring
of 2005 to return to the musical theater, if only for one night. In
another piece of inspired casting, she portrayed the cock-eyed
optimist from Arkansas, Ensign Nellie Forbush, in a special concert
version of Rodgers & Hammerstein's South Pacific performed at
Carnegie Hall. The all-star production, also featuring Broadway star
Brian Stokes Mitchell and actor Alec Baldwin, was filmed for a PBS
special on the network's Great Performances series and recorded for an
album, both of which appeared in 2006.
By 2005, the catalogs of Mercury and MCA had been combined in the major
label Universal, and in November MCA released McEntire's first combined
hits collection, the double-CD set Reba: #1's, with two newly recorded
tracks. It went gold and platinum simultaneously. In 2006, as she began
the sixth season of Reba, McEntire also voiced a character in the
holiday film release Charlotte's Web. The sixth season of Reba proved
to be the last, as the show signed off the air on February 18, 2007.
~William Ruhlmann, All Music Guide
Written by William Ruhlmann