page_title: Reba McEntire
section_title: Personal life
hierarchical_section_title: Reba McEntire / Personal life
caption_attribution_description: English: Reba McEntire at a ceremony for Vince Gill to receive a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
context_page_description: Reba Nell McEntire is an American country singer, songwriter, actress, and record producer. She began her career in the music industry as a high school student singing in the Kiowa High School band, on local radio shows with her siblings, and at rodeos. While a sophomore in college at Southeastern Oklahoma State University, she performed the National Anthem at the National Finals Rodeo in Oklahoma City and caught the attention of country artist Red Steagall who brought her to Nashville, Tennessee. She signed a contract with Mercury Records a year later in 1975. She released her first solo album in 1977 and released five additional studio albums under the label until 1983.
  Signing with MCA Nashville Records, McEntire took creative control over her second MCA album, My Kind of Country, which had a more traditional country sound and produced two number one singles: "How Blue" and "Somebody Should Leave". The album brought her breakthrough success, bringing her a series of successful albums and number one singles in the 1980s and 1990s.
context_section_description: Two of her siblings have also had careers in the music industry. Her brother Pake dabbled in the country music industry in the late 1980s but returned to Oklahoma after a brief stint. He owns and operates a 1,000 acre ranch near Coalgate, Oklahoma, and continues to rodeo. Her sister Susie McEntire-Eaton (Martha Susan "Susie" McEntire-Eaton, formerly Luchsinger) is a successful Christian music singer who travels the country with her husband, speaking and performing. She also has an older sister, Alice Foran, a retired social worker who resides in Lane, Oklahoma. Her niece Calamity McEntire is an assistant basketball coach at the University of Dayton.
  
  In 1976, McEntire married steer wrestling champion and rancher Charlie Battles who was 10 years her senior and had two sons from his previous marriage. The couple shared a ranch in Oklahoma. In 1987, McEntire divorced Battles and moved to Nashville, Tennessee to further pursue her career. In 1989, McEntire married her manager and former steel guitar player, Narvel Blackstock. The couple wed at Lake Tahoe on a boat in a private ceremony. Together, the pair took over all aspects of McEntire's career, forming Starstruck Entertainment, which was originally designed to help manage her career. From her marriage to Blackstock, McEntire inherited three stepchildren - Chassidy, Shawna, and Brandon - and then gave birth to a son, Shelby Steven McEntire Blackstock, in February 1990. On August 3, 2015, it was announced in a joint statement on McEntire's website that she and Blackstock had been separated for a few months after twenty-six years of marriage. McEntire announced in December 2015 that their divorce had been finalized on October 28, 2015. Despite the divorce, McEntire remains very close to her three stepchildren as well as the Blackstock family; she considers her stepchildren's six children to be her grandchildren.
   McEntire's stepson Brandon Blackstock is married to singer Kelly Clarkson. Clarkson gave birth to their first child, a daughter named River, on June 12, 2014. They had their second child, a son named Remington “Remy”, on April 12, 2016. Speaking about their impending marriage in 2013, McEntire stated she was "Thrilled to death, to have my buddy as my daughter-in-law. I mean, who could ask for more?" McEntire is a Christian, and she has stated that her faith in God has helped her immensely throughout her life.
  In 2017, McEntire began a relationship with photographer Anthony "Skeeter" Lasuzzo. The couple met through McEntire's association with Kix Brooks. In describing her feelings about Lasuzzo, she stated, "We're totally in love — absolutely," she says. "I wouldn’t put up with somebody for two years if I wasn’t in love with 'em!" As of November 2019, McEntire has confirmed that she is no longer with Lasuzzo after two years of dating.
  In 1992, she opened Reba's Ranch House in Denison, TX. Similar to a Ronald McDonald House, the house incorporates holistic care by providing a calm setting for rest, warm meals for nourishment and sensitive staff for spiritual connections to guests who have loved ones being treated at the nearby Texoma Medical Center. Over the course of her career, she has been and continues to be an active supporter of various charitable organizations including Habitat for Humanity, The Salvation Army, the American Red Cross, Feeding America and Celebrity Fight Night. She has been honored with the Minnie Pearl Award, the ACM Home Depot Humanitarian Award and the Andrea Bocelli Foundation Humanitarian Award for her efforts. In 2018, she was honored with the Horatio Alger Award for Education, Charity Work. Named after the "rags to riches" writer, the award recognizes perseverance and giving back.
caption: McEntire in September 2012
exif: {"Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "96", "Image YResolution": "96", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "Adobe Photoshop Elements 10.0 Windows", "Image DateTime": "2012:09:21 20:58:09", "Image ExifOffset": "172", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "310", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "10414", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "1021", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "871"}