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Reba McEntire labored arduous on her family’s ranch from an early age before skyrocketing to country music stardom.
In a new interview with the Wall Street Journal, “The Voice” coach, 69, recalled her rural upbringing and the way all of her family members helped with the day by day operations of her father’s cattle enterprise.
“I didn’t play cowgirl growing up,” McEntire mentioned. “I was one.”
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Reba McEntire became a cowgirl on her family’s ranch at the age of 5. (Reba McEntire Facebook/Getty)
She continued, “My family lived on an 8,000-acre ranch in Chockie, Oklahoma, where my father ran several thousand cattle a year.”
“I began working on our ranch at age 5,” the “Fancy” hitmaker recalled. “If Daddy needed a driver to move grain in his pickup truck, he came in and got whoever was there. “
“I was so little that Daddy put a 50-pound feed sack on the driver’s seat before putting me on top of it. I’d be on my knees to work the steering wheel. He’d put the truck in granny gear, jump out and off I’d go.”
McEntire was born in March 1955 to folks Clark and Jackie McEntire, who additionally shared daughters Alice and Susie in addition to son Pake.
McEntire and her three siblings all began working on the ranch after they had been younger. (Reba McEntire Instagram)
She recalled that her family lived in a small grey home on the ranch that had one toilet. “With the girls – Alice, Susie, Mama and myself, we’d all be in there at the same time, and there never was a problem,” McEntire mentioned of sharing the toilet.
“We loved each other’s company,” she added.
McEntire defined that she was very near her siblings whereas they had been rising up within the small group within the hills of southeastern Oklahoma.
“There were no kids nearby to play with, so we just had each other,” she mentioned.
McEntire recalled that she and her siblings teamed as much as function the ranch whereas Clark, who was a three-time world champion steer roper, competed in rodeos.
“I didn’t play cowgirl growing up. I was one.”
“Daddy was gone rodeoing between June and September,” she remembered. “Running that big ranch while he was away fell to us kids. We also had a hired hand, Louie Sandman, and Grandpap, John McEntire, who was a champion steer roper himself.”
The singer informed the WSJ that she and her siblings would assist out with chores on the ranch within the morning before faculty.
“In my teens, in the fall, Pake and I would gather the horses in a 40-acre patch while Daddy fixed breakfast,” McEntire recalled.
She continued, “We’d get them saddled and head back to eat. After, we’d hop in the truck, load the horses into a trailer and take them to help steer the cattle into the area where they would be weighed and sold. Then we’d go to school with Mama. She was the school secretary.”
The singer mentioned that she would assist out with ranch chores before faculty. (Reba McEntire Instagram)
In addition to her tasks on the ranch and attending faculty, McEntire mentioned she participated in different actions, together with basketball and observe, and performed guitar and piano. However, singing was her ardour.
“I always wanted to be on stage,” McEntire mentioned. “I was the third of four kids, so I was pretty much invisible. I had to carve out something for me to gain attention, and that was singing.”
“Performing gained Mama’s adoration,” she added. “I yearned to hear her say, ‘That was real good, Reba.’”
Jackie had additionally dreamed of changing into a country singer and inspired McEntire and her siblings of their musical aspirations.
The Grammy Award winner recalled that she shaped a band with Pake and Susie referred to as the Singing McEntires they usually carried out collectively from junior excessive by way of highschool.
“She was our best friend, our cheerleader and our disciplinarian,” McEntire mentioned of her mom, who handed away at the age of 93 in 2020 after a battle with most cancers.
“And she was our rock,” McEntire added. “Country music meant a great deal to her.”
McEntire shaped the band the Singing McEntires along with her brother Pake and sister Susie. (Reba McEntire Instagram)
Meanwhile, McEntire recalled that Clark was a distant father and barely displayed affection for his youngsters, noting that Jackie “picked up the slack.”
“He wasn’t a hugger nor was he much good at expressing his love,” she mentioned of Clark. “It wasn’t in his nature. “
While talking with the WSJ, McEntire recalled the primary time Clark informed her that he cherished her.
“Daddy finally said it to me in his hospital room after triple-bypass surgery in ’87. When I said I had to go, he said, ‘OK, well, I love you,'” McEntire mentioned.
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The singer informed the outlet that her family was bowled over by Clark’s phrases.
“We all looked at each other,” McEntire siad. “We figured he was still on his surgery meds.”
Clark died in 2014 at the age of 86 after a lengthy sickness following a stroke.
McEntire is pictured along with her father Clark and mom Jackie. (Reba McEntire Instagram)
McEntire wasn’t simply a cowgirl on the ranch. She additionally adopted in her father and grandfather’s footsteps and commenced competing in rodeos as a barrel racer at the age of 11.
In a clip from her audiobook “Not That Fancy” that McEntire shared on TikTok, the singer recalled she was “nervous as I’d ever been” throughout her first rodeo competitors.
She famous that her father and grandfather, in addition to Pake and Alice, who additionally competed in rodeos, had “all set a high bar for what we McEntires could do in the arena. And I felt a lot of pressure to make them proud.”
While McEntire did not win her first rodeo, she continued competing as a barrel racer for an additional decade, together with whereas she was attending faculty at Southeastern Oklahoma State, in keeping with the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum’s web site.
In her TikTok video, McEntire defined that barrel racing helped put together her for her music profession. Though McEntire would later win ribbons and championships, she famous that she needed to work more durable than her siblings to achieve the game since she wasn’t a pure.
“Daddy as soon as requested me, ‘Reba, why do you always want to do something you’re not good at?'” McEntire recalled. “Of course, he wanted me to concentrate on my singing.”
She continued, “The kind of drive I learned on horseback set me up for building a career in music. In this industry, the key thing to do is just keep going and keep racing against yourself. There are a lot of talented, hard-working people in the world, but I’m convinced that it’s the ones with an unshakable belief in themselves who end up succeeding most often.”
Reba McEntire, pictured in 1976. (Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images)
“Or maybe it’s those who are just too stubborn to know when to quit,” McEntire added with a laugh.
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The singer told the WSJ that she initially majored in music at Southeastern Oklahoma State but found it was “it was way over my head.”
“I switched to an education major, and music became my minor,” she recalled. “Teaching was my backup plan.”
However, McEntire’s first big break came during her sophomore year of college in 1974, when she was hired to sing the national anthem at the National Rodeo in Oklahoma City.
Country artist Red Steagall was in attendance and watched McEntire’s performance. She told the WSJ that a chance encounter with Steagall after the rodeo led her to move to Nashville.
“After the rodeo, we all went over to the Hilton,” she said. “A bunch of cowboys were there having a guitar pull. One sang and played guitar and then handed it off to the next guy.”
Reba McEntire at the 1986 CMA Awards. (Getty Images)
McEntire remembered that she, Pake and Susie then “sang a bit of harmony.”
“That’s the place we noticed Red once more,” she recalled.
McEntire defined that Jackie approached Steagall about serving to her youngsters launch careers in country music.
“Mama wasn’t shy. She said, ‘Red, can you get Pake, Reba and Susie to Nashville?’ He said, ‘Jackie, I’m doing all I can to keep my head afloat. But I’ll take Reba to cut a demo tape and we’ll see what happens.’” McEntire mentioned.
“The following year, in 1975, I was in a Nashville studio. I wasn’t nervous at all. Honestly, I didn’t know if I wanted to do it anyway,” she recalled. “Doing well as a singer would mean leaving my family behind.”
“Glenn Keener at PolyGram heard the tape and brought two reels to the label’s Chicago headquarters – mine and another gal’s. It could’ve been her, but they chose me and here I am.”
McEntire has received three Grammy Awards. (Kevin Mazur/Getty Images for Roc Nation)
Afterward, McEntire signed with Polygram/Mercury Records. She and Steagall later collaborated on the 2007 hit “Here We Go Again.”
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During her interview with the WSJ, McEntire detailed how she realized that she had scored her first No. 1 single on the Billboard’s Hot Country Chart.
“In 1983, after my tour bus broke down, I called my manager, Don Williams, to tell him. He said that my single, ‘Can’t Even Get the Blues,’ had just gone to No. 1 on the charts,” she mentioned.
McEntire continued, “I hung up and called Mama. She said, ‘Well, you finally did it.’ I said, ‘No, ma’am. We did it.’ I still tear up just thinking about that call.”
She changed Blake Shelton as a coach on “The Voice” in 2023. (Trae Patton/NBC through Getty Images)
The singer now has a complete of 24 No. 1 hits on Billboard’s Hot Country Songs chart. McEntire has acquired three Grammy awards, received CMA feminine vocalist of the 12 months 4 occasions and was acknowledged at the 2018 Kennedy Center Honors for her lifetime of contributions to American tradition.
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She made her performing debut in 1989, co-starring alongside Kevin Bacon within the horror comedy “Tremors.” McEntire starred in her TV sitcom “Reba” for six seasons from 2001 to 2007, incomes a Golden Globe nomination in 2004.
In 2023, McEntire changed Blake Shelton as a coach on the fact singing competitors present “The Voice.”
The singer is co-starring along with her boyfriend Rex Linn within the new sitcom “Happy’s Place.” (Getty Images)
The singer can also be starring within the new NBC sitcom “Happy’s Place,” reuniting along with her former “Reba” co-star Melissa Peterman. The sequence additionally stars McEntire’s boyfriend Rex Linn.
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During her interview with the WSJ, McEntire mentioned she and Linn divide their time between their houses in Los Angeles and Nashville. The Queen of Country has additionally stayed near her roots, telling the outlet that she and Linn personal a ranch/farm about 20 minutes outdoors of Nashville.
“He’s on the new sitcom, but out there, that’s our happy place,” she mentioned.
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