Sean Kilpatrick, Edmonton Sun via AP Reba McEntire took her act north of the border last month to the main stage at the Big Valley Jamboree in Camrose, Alberta, Canada. Click photo for larger image.

Nashville is no place for sissies. But in a business that's predictably unpredictable, Reba McEntire is a consistent anomaly.

The cute redheaded rodeo singer with the big voice from tiny Chockie, Okla., signed her first record deal in the mid-1970s and cracked the country charts in 1976. Despite the dramatic twists and turns that have rocked Music Row over the past 30 years, the major players still consider her a major player. In an industry that worships and demands youth, especially among women artists, country radio played middle-aged McEntire's "Somebody" enough times to propel the CD, "Room to Breathe," to the No. 4 spot on the Country Albums chart. Capping a long list of industry awards, she recently set a record (51) for the most solo Top 10 hits by a country female.

In 1990, McEntire surprised film critics with a credible role as a gun-toting survivalist in the cult thriller "Tremors." In 2001, she delighted stage critics after inheriting the lead in a Broadway production of "Annie Get Your Gun." The discovery of her acting chops led to a namesake role in The WB TV series "Reba," which begins its fourth season Sept. 17.

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On the set during a break in taping, days before traveling to Pittsburgh to headline the 10th annual Dollar Bank Jamboree Sunday at Point State Park, McEntire talked about "Room to Breathe," "Reba" and what it takes to survive in the business.

You must be busy.

Well, sure, this is a busy time. We're in the second week of the TV show, we're pushing the second single from the album, and we have this tour coming up. ... It's very exciting, if my body can keep up with me.

Do you think of this as a two-tiered career or does it all seem like one big blur?

Both [laughs]. It's just what you have to do today, and you compartmentalize. Sometimes I'm an actor or a script editor, sometimes I'm a musician, sometimes I'm a business person.

I've had a great 25 years in the music business, and if it was going to end I was wasn't going to worry about it. The Broadway thing came up and while I was in New York, the TV show came up. But I do like my music. It's very rewarding. We decided to do the TV show and the tour at the same time.

Sometimes artists stretch themselves too thin and their fans sort of lose focus. Was that a concern?

It was. It's been four years since my last album, I've never gone that long before. I didn't know if my fans would stay with me or not. But they stayed with me on Broadway, they came to L.A. for TV tapings, they stayed with me on this album, and they're active on the Internet and fan club. I've got the best fans.

They were slow to pick up on the single.

Yeah, that had us concerned. The album came out in November and it took 30 weeks for "Somebody" to work its way up the charts. Usually, it's 15 weeks. But this one had a resurgence of life, especially after the video came out. MCA is really kicking butt with it.

You wear so many hats, how do you know which one to wear? I mean, do you set up a business situation where you can make art, or do you make your art and put on your business hat to sell it?

Good question. What you have to do is be an artist first, whether it's finding the right music or getting a good script. With songs, if it touches my heart when I sing it, hopefully it will touch the listener's heart. I've had some discussions with producers about that when they disagreed, but if I'm gonna sing it, I have to love it first. Once you have that done, you put the politician hat on and work it through the system, then you put the business hat on and market it.

"Somebody" is a great song. Where'd you find it?

It was pitched by the publishing company. It was on the songwriter Dave Berg's first album. I was a little worried about that, you know, didn't want to steal his thunder. He's sort of an alternative roots-rock guy, but this song isn't and the demo sounds a lot like what we did [on "Room to Breathe"].

The second single, "He Gets That From Me," is very subtle, very sensitive -- you have to hear the whole song to get the story. It's almost too sophisticated for radio.

It's about a bitter divorce. I'll tell ya, toward the end it went real sour for me. I called [writers Steven Dale Jones and Phillip White], and I talked with them about changing the end.

You asked them to rewrite their song?

That only happened one other time before. I don't know if I could have done that without editing all those scripts on "Reba." The first season, I just did the scripts as they came in. But by the second season, I was taking them back to the writers and asking for this and that. It's gotten me much more involved in the show, and it's crossed over some to the music side of my career. At least on this song, I got more involved in the writing.

How do you see "Reba" evolving since that first season?

In the character development. It's gone from a woman jilted, to a child pregnant, to grasping life, to screwing up life, raisin' kids and grandkids. The writers are just fantastic and so are the actors.

Do you want the show to be more issue-oriented or comedic?

Right now, I think it's a great blend of both. When an issue comes up, we talk about it. And I think people see that on TV and they sit around and talk about things that are sometimes hard to discuss. These are issues that people in the United States have to deal with. It's not a joke every four lines or anything like that, but you can find humor in the most sad things, at the darkest hour.

What's Reba doing this fall?

She has another love interest, she's always trying to find a new boyfriend. This year we're dealing with where Kyra will be staying and Van's going to have something happen in football.

Are you looking forward to getting back on the road?

Like I said, if my body can keep up with me. The good thing about touring is we get back to our Nashville home more often. We've done some shows already on the West Coast. I'll tell ya, it was weird the first time on stage. I was just standing there savoring it. When I was touring for 25 years in a row, all the clothes changing and razzle dazzle was done to make it interesting to me. Some people have drugs, I have costume changes. Now, we have nice staging, but no bells or whistles. We're gonna make this tour about the songs, and we're bringing the two sides of my career together. We do "Love Revival" [from "Room to Breathe"] on the TV show. Kids in the audience were saying, "Gosh, mom, I didn't know she sings, too."