Rediscovering her soul
Trisha Yearwood doesn’t think 12 years between albums is a long time, even if it probably feels like forever for fans.
TRISHA Yearwood never planned on letting 12 years pass between solo albums. But sometimes life has other plans.
For the country star, that meant more than a decade spent writing cookbooks, hosting her cooking show Trisha’s Southern Kitchen, touring with husband Garth Brooks and being a “bonus mom” to his three daughters.
“My life changed completely when I moved to Oklahoma and married the cowboy,” Yearwood says with a laugh, calling from Nashville. “Music had to take a back seat. People ask women, ‘How do you do it all?’ My answer is, ‘You don’t.’ When something has to come to the forefront, other things go on the backburner. It’s a constant moving of those pieces. Sometimes music is in the front. Sometimes it’s your family. Other times it’s cooking. If you’re focusing on one, something else is taking a back seat.”
On the country front, she recently released Every Girl, her first solo album since 2007’s Heaven, Heartache And The Power Of Love. It debuted at No. 5 on Billboard’s Top Country Albums chart, while the lead single Every Girl In This Town became a Top 40 hit on country radio. It was a welcome return for a veteran female artiste at a time when the genre is topheavy with country dudes. Yearwood admits she was happily surprised by the single’s commercial success.
“My expectations were kind of low,” she laughs. “I never even thought we would go to radio because I’m a 55-year-old woman. It’s been such a nice surprise.
I think it’s because the song struck a chord.”
The sparkling, guitar-driven anthem showcases Yearwood’s impressive vocal range. She brings emotional nuance to the characters in her song, from the young girl looking out from the top of a Ferris wheel who asks “What’s out there for me?” to mothers working hard to get their dreams off the ground.
“Every Girl In This Town is a girl power song without getting on a soapbox and being preachy,” she says. “It doesn’t put down men, because most men have an ‘every girl’ in their life.”
Brooks guests on What Gave Me Away, a sultry blues number featuring a woman wondering which moment exactly revealed her romantic feelings. “It is a personal, intimate song, and he’s the guy,” she says. “I couldn’t imagine singing it with anybody but Garth.”
The two first met in 1987 when both were aspiring country artistes in Nashville, making ends meet as demo singers on Music Row. At the time, they were married to other people. They remained friends and occasional collaborators through the years as Brooks sky-rocketed into superstardom and Yearwood built an award-winning career as one of country’s classiest acts.
It wasn’t until the early 2000s that both singers found themselves divorced and single at the same time and became romantically involved. They married in 2005.
At the time, Brooks had put his music career on hold and moved to Owasso, Oklahoma, to help raise his three daughters from his marriage to first wife, Sandy Mahl.
Although Yearwood continued to tour early in their marriage, she quickly realised she needed to prioritise the new relationships in her life and her new role as a stepmother.
“When Garth and I got married, I had just turned 41. I inherited these three girls. I wasn’t even sure what to do with them – I had a dog,” Yearwood recalls with a laugh.
“In my 20s, I made a conscious effort not to have children because I chose my career. A lot of my friends like Faith Hill and Martina Mcbride had their kids and took with them. But that wasn’t what I wanted to do, so I missed that moment. But now I have the best of everything. The girls allowed me to be in their lives. It worked out really well for me – I got to do everything I wanted and still have the family.”
When the youngest Brooks daughter graduated from high school, Brooks and Yearwood moved back to Nashville. In 2014, Brooks hit the road on a blockbuster world tour. Yearwood performed with him as they travelled the globe, squeezing in time to film her cooking show.
In 2016, she and Brooks released the holiday duet album Christmas Together. But soon Yearwood realised that more than a decade had gone by since her last solo album. Feeling the need to get back in the studio, she made up for lost time, recording both the Sinatra and Every Girl albums.
“This is who I am, this is my soul,” Yearwood says about making music. “I learned from Garth early on that it’s an honour to get to do this job.”