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Saturday September 16, 2006

Barbara Mandrell is back in the spotlight briefly, with a tribute album

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP): Barbara Mandrell is OK with stepping away from retirement to promote a new tribute album, tape a TV special and co-host a benefit concert.

Just don't ask her to sing.

"I can't think of anything that would make me sing'' professionally, Mandrell, who retired in 1997 after 38 years as an entertainer, said Friday. "I gave my best, and now I'm giving my best at home.''

After years of quiet domestic life, Mandrell is back in the spotlight again, at least briefly.

She attended a press conference Friday to promote the upcoming album, "She Was Country When Country Wasn't Cool: A Tribute to Barbara Mandrell.'' The Oct. 17 release on BNA Records features a parade of big names singing Mandrell's hits: Reba McEntire, Kenny Chesney, Terri Clark, LeAnn Rimes, Brad Paisley, Gretchen Wilson, Sara Evans, Willie Nelson, Shelby Lynne, Lorrie Morgan, Dierks Bentley, Alabama's Randy Owen, gospel star Cece Winans and newcomer Blaine Larson.

She's also taping an accompanying special for the Great American Country TV network that airs Oct. 15, and is co-hosting the "Broadway Meets Country'' benefit concert with Broadway star Jane Krakowski on Oct. 30.

Dressed in an ivory suit and high heels, the 57-year-old Mandrell said she isn't having second thoughts about retirement. The only time she's sang into a microphone the last nine years, she said, was at a birthday party for her sister Louise.

"I've enjoyed being a wife and mother,'' she said, though she added she could do without the housework. "My life is good, really good.''

Mandrell first hit the charts in 1969 with the Otis Redding and Jerry Butler song, "I've Been Loving You too Long (to Stop Now).'' She went on to record more than 50 Top-40 country hits, including "Sleeping Single in a Double Bed,'' "(If Loving You Is Wrong) I Don't Want to be Right'' and "I Was Country When Country Wasn't Cool.''

At her peak, she had a variety show on NBC with her sisters Louise and Irlene in the early 1980s and won the Country Music Association's Entertainer of the Year award in 1980 and 1981.

Her last professional performance was Oct. 23, 1997. Shortly after, she sold all her musical instruments except for her steel guitar, which is in the Country Music Hall of Fame, and a Dobro with an inscription from her parents on it.

Mandrell, who was born in Houston and raised in Oceanside, California, said she didn't want to be tempted to return to show business.

On Friday, she thanked her father and former manager, Irby, who sat nearby, her band the Do-Rites, and the songwriters, record executives and fans who've been part of her career.

She said the new tribute album, for which she attended the recording sessions, has given her a chance to do something she didn't get to do much of when she was singing her own songs.

"I didn't savor it as much as I should have,'' Mandrell said. "Now, I'm getting to feel that again.''

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