The Indianapolis Star from Indianapolis, Indiana • Page 105

THE INDIANAPOLIS STAR- SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 1, 197 PAGE E-6- Strong family, strong song themes follow Reba A third new sonc. What You rim; 1 "'-J 4" -if ''ft with Bowen's longtime aide Don Lanier. It was McEntire. though, who made the picks. "Nobody knows what kind of songs a person wants to sing except that person." McEntire said.

"My whole feeling was that It would be Illogical to find a song for her to sing." Bowen said. "A woman like Reba must sing songs that women can relate to. and not songs that they think some redneck hillbilly wants them to sing. They're not the audience." McEntire. In fact, won't do songs with references to smoking or gratuitous mentions of alcohol.

She turned down Does Ft. Worth Ever Cross Your Mind, which became a No. 1 hit for George Strait, for its reference to beer. "I don't want to be the one to influence a 13 year-old. have them think that Reba says it's okay." McEntire said.

McEntire, who has produced her last three albums with Bowen What Am I Conna Do About You, Whoever's in New England, and the latest. The Last One to Know chooses songs that tell a story with a strong point of view. One new song. The Stairs, Is about a battered woman. Another, Just Across the Rio Grande, is a vision of America from the point of view of an Impoverished Mexican.

Cnnna Do About Me is about a divorce as seen through the eyes of a child. It has special resonance for McEntire now, since she and her husband of 1 1 years, former rodeo star Charlie Battles, are getting divorced. They have no children. "It worked out real fine for a long time until I was kinda asked to come home and stay home and slow down," McEntire said of the marriage. "I worked so hard and so long to get where I am now that I didn't want to slow down.

For so many years, Charlie was so supportive, and then it kinda wasn't the most important thing to him. This is my life out here, the music business. I love what I'm doing. When you're out on the road all the time, the family is the people that's out on the road with you." Push came to shove in McEn-tire's marriage when she found, on one of her infrequent visits home to Stringtown, that she simply could not sit still. McEntire's restless nature may soon be reflected in her music.

She's a leader of what some have described as country music's "neo-traditionalist" movement, which scorns the elaborate orchestrations and arrangements that once marked the efforts of too many country entertainers to "cross over" to the pop market. By WAYNE ROBINS In country sinfirr Reba Mr Entire's family, records aren't just made they're made to be broken. Grandpa and Daddy were lxth world champion steer ropers. Reba herself was a strong contender to carry on the family's winning ways in the rodeo, spending 10 years from the time she was 11 years old competing as a barrel racer, an obstacle-course event. Sitting In the chute, waiting to ride.

McF.ntire used to joke with Gail Pesca, one of the most consistent women's rodeo champions. "She'd sit there and say. I always wanted to McEntlrc recounted the other afternoon before a concert in Fairfax. Va. "And I'd say.

'I'd give anything to win a barrel race. You wanna She'd say. And I'd say. 'I don't really Pesca would take the blue ribbons. Uut it wasn't long before McF.ntire would bring home gold records, as well as other kinds.

Recently, McEntirc. 32. won the Country Music Association's award for best female singer for the fourth consecutive year, breaking the threc-in-a-row record previously held by legends such as Loretta Lynn and Tammy Wynctte. McEntire will make her debut Wednesday at that Grand Ole Opry for the tuxedo set. Carnegie Hall.

On the nationally telecast awards program, some of coun try music's female singers referred to each other as "girls" or "gals'" or even "thicks." McEntire Is conspicuous among her peer group lor using the word "women." "I don't like to be referred to as a or a 'chick' or a McEntire said, her voice firm, a blend of Western twang and Southern drawl of her native Oklahoma. "I am a working woman. 1 think women do need to be strong. A woman is a very affectionate. Intimate, feeling, caring, warmhearted person.

But my mother Is one of the strongest people I've ever met In my life. She can cry right along with you at the saddest movie or the most heartbreaking moment. Uut, by durn. when the stress and tension Is there, she's the back-Ixine." That strength served McEntire well when she went against the prevailing tradition In country music and took control of her career. The standard procedure called for a record company to assign a female singer a producer who would scout music-publishing companies for songs, hire the musicians, do the arrangements and tell the singer where to stand next to the microphone.

After being discovered by country singer Red Steagal when she sang the national anthem at a rodeo championship In Oklahoma City in 1974. McEntire had a slow and unproductive ride through that crusty Nashville system, recording unsatisfying material awash with overbearing string arrangements. nn Reba McEntire cords' Nashville operation about four years ago. McEntire found a sympathetic ear. "I went to Jimmy Bowen and said, 'They're not finding the kind of songs I McEntire said.

'Let me go find them." McEntire began making the rounds of publishing companies "It was a very conforming type of thing at the time, and I wasn't comfortable with it." McEntire said. When Jimmy Bowen. a veteran producer and record executive who was outspokenly critical of country music's artistic stagnation took over MCA Re Q95 AND SUNSHINE PROMOTIONS WELCOME Highlieht You BLA Noontime witl th Music with a with special guest PRESENTS A MURDER MYSTERY DINNER To Be Committed at THE HISTORIC HANNA HOUSE 3801 Madison SPOTLIGHT RECITAL Monday, Nov. 2, 1987 12 p.m. Green Room, Circle Theatre Recital for Children featuring: Rave Pankratz, violin Marianne Williams L'llyot, piano Program: THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 26 7:30 MARKET SQUARE ARENA S1 5.50 $16.50 DAY OF SHOW Tickets available at the MSA Box Office and all Ticketmaster Locations including Karma Records and Block's Department Stores.

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