What: Reba McEntire with Gord Bamford
When: Tuesday, 7:30 p.m. (doors at 6:30)
Where: Save-on-Foods Memorial Centre
Tickets: $69.50/$89.50 (plus service charges) in person at the Save-on-Foods Memorial Centre box office, by phone at 250-220-7777, or at selectyourtickets.com
Reba McEntire has shifted the focus of her live shows over the past few years, partly out of financial necessity.
But by eschewing the glitz, glamour and constant costume changes of her heady days, McEntire was happy to discover that her new, laid-back approach to performing has re-emphasized the stories behind her songs.
“I’m telling the audience what happened when I found a particular song and why I liked it so much — a little history,” the Oklahoma native said in an interview, her unmistakable drawl untempered by decades of living outside the state.
“I talk to ’em, and that’s what I like to see. When I was growing up, I’d watch Mel Tillis, the Statler Brothers and Ronnie Milsap. I loved their music, but I loved when they told me a story.”
Her old formula had its time and place. At her peak, McEntire was one of the biggest draws on the touring circuit, country or otherwise. Her outings in the years since may have been scaled down, but they are no less profitable. Though she has no new album to promote, expectations are that her upcoming 11-date tour of Canada, which starts Tuesday in Victoria, will be similarly well-received.
As much fun as she had during the 1980s and 1990s, McEntire enjoys the manner in which she tours today. It is more manageable for everyone, she said, including her husband and manager, Narvel Blackstock, who also manages Kelly Clarkson and Blake Shelton.
“We had 21 trucks out there and more lights than Madonna and Michael Jackson had on their shows,” McEntire said of her past performances. “We were wheelin’ and dealin’. Fifteen clothes changes, having lots of fun. Nowadays, we’ve scaled it back totally.”
McEntire, 58, and her band had a few scattered dates over the summer, but took September off. She is “ready to get back at it” after a recent holiday that took her to Western Canada a few weeks ago (after she and Blackstock journeyed on the Rocky Mountaineer train through Alberta, they hopped into B.C. on a quick fishing trip, she said.)
Though her Canadian tour is down statistically from her earlier jaunts — McEntire once did an 85-city tour with Brooks & Dunn — it’s a reasonable amount of time to be on the road, she suggests. “I heard there is something like 27 headline country tours out for 2014,” she said. “How are they going to do that? I think it’s going to be a train wreck. Everybody is thinking they can go out and headline.”
In the modern music era, in which performers make the bulk of their living by touring, it’s easy to understand why there is such a logjam on the road — but it doesn’t make it right, McEntire said. The problem with the current business model is that young artists are trying to be too big, too soon. Something, or someone, will have to give eventually, McEntire said.
“I’ll never forget the first time I headlined. Bill Carter was my manager, and he was associated with the Rolling Stones. He said, ‘Reba, you’ve got to headline.’ So we went to Yuma, Ariz., and I think I had 800 people. I had to write a cheque to get out of town, but it was about establishing my career. It was a lot of work, but you’ve got to start small, and grow, or you’ll remain a middle act.”
McEntire had the good fortune of learning the ropes in an era during which those in charge passed on short-term money to ensure long-term success.
Looking back on her 37-year career as a performer — which saw her sell more than 33 million records over a 20-year period — she is grateful for having the time to develop her skill. From the time she recorded her first solo song, I Don’t Want to Be a One Night Stand, on Jan. 22, 1976, until the success of 1982’s I’m Not That Lonely Yet, her first Top Five hit, making a living was tough.
“It took me six years. Thank God the record label kept me on. It wasn’t a cram it down your throat, hurry up, throw it out, you’d better be No. 5 or better or you’re out. Thank goodness it wasn’t that way when I was getting started, or I never would have gotten my toe in the door.”
Once that door opened, McEntire created enough buzz to ensure that it would never hit her on the way out.
She has added plenty of work-related facets to her career as a musician. There is Reba the lifestyle brand that includes clothing, footwear, luggage and bedding. McEntire is also co-creator of Starstruck Studios, a massive recording and broadcast facility in Nashville, where she and Blackstock spend the better part of their time.
A natural performer, she followed the lead of Dolly Parton, who parlayed her rapport with audiences into a successful acting career. In 1989, McEntire made the switch into film and television, and continues to work in the field (her most recent starring vehicle, Malibu Country, ended its run on ABC earlier this year, but she is open to the idea of more acting work.)
Because of her instant likability, audiences feel a kinship with McEntire. That she has fought some insurmountable hurdles in her life (a 1991 plane crash that killed eight of her bandmates and crew remains a point of intense emotion and great difficulty) makes her even more endearing to her legion of fans.
McEntire is told often by her followers that her 1994 song and movie of the same name, Is There Life Out There?, gave them the impetus to get on with their lives. “Women will come up to me and say because of that song, they went back to college and got their degree after their kids were grown. Music is very, very strong. It heals. It talks to you like nobody else can talk to you.”
She has been talking a lot during the past decade to some of her best friends in music, often about the bond that exists between female country singers. There is a rich history of those who deserve kudos from the new generation, she said. McEntire is already added to that list, but she isn’t ready to shuffle off the scene just yet.
She has a responsibility to make audiences look back as often as they gaze forward.
“Dolly paved such a great freeway for women, so did Loretta [Lynn], Tammy [Wynette], Barbara Mandrell. I’ve got to keep pavin’ that freeway for the gals in country music. Maybe it gives them some ammunition, incentive, inspiration to continue on and work hard and pave that way.”
Some stars from the current generation are clued into the roots of country music — Kelly Clarkson being one among many. McEntire said she feels blessed that her “good buddy” and frequent collaborator is engaged to her stepson, Brandon Blackstock. With people such as Clarkson holding the candle for the new generation, country music is in good hands, McEntire said.
It’s a tradition she helped create. When all is said and done, many expect she will be feted much in the way Loretta Lynn was in Coal Miner’s Daughter or Patsy Cline was in Sweet Dreams — with a silver-screen biopic chronicling McEntire’s rise from a cattle ranch in Chockie, Okla., to Broadway and beyond.
McEntire has not yet been approached with such a project. She said she will leave that in the hands of her husband of 23 years, who has some tough decisions to make. “I told Narvel, ‘I’m not gonna do it until I die, so you can pick anybody you want to play me,’ ” she quipped. “But they had better be damn goodlooking.”
