Kellie Pickler is mixing business with pleasure, again, as she teams up with her songwriter and producer husband Kyle Jacobs to create her fifth album.
This isn’t the first time the partners in life have become partners in music; the pair penned songs for Pickler’s 2013 album The Woman I Am.
“I grew up listening to traditional country music,” said Pickler in an interview. “For me, ‘The Woman I Am’ is just a collection of songs I’ve either found or written that just tell us different stories. It’s kind of like audio books, and each song is a different chapter.”
The American Idol alum and former Dancing With the Stars winner has recently teamed up with fellow DWTS participant Valerie Harper to help fight and spread the word about lung cancer.
The Mary Tyler Moore Show vet partnered with the American Lung Association and CVS Caremark to launch Lung Force, a new national movement aimed at educating the public about the disease.
Watch Pickler in action:
Harper was diagnosed with lung cancer in 2009 and it has spread to her brain, causing the diagnosis to become terminal. Called leptomeningeal carcinomatosis, this cancer lives microscopically where the spinal fluid is.
Pickler feels close to the cause because her grandmother died from the disease. At the event, the singer performed the song “My Angel,” which was written about her late grandmother.
“She was the one that I called mom,” Pickler said in an interview. “She was diagnosed with lung cancer back in 2002 and she died instantly. She died the very next day. I got a little emotional performing a song so personal that I wrote with some friends of mine about my grandmother. Just being in the room here today with lung cancer survivors as well as other people who have lost loved ones from lung cancer, just made it more emotional.”
Pickler hasn’t revealed when she plans on dropping her new album, but fans can catch up with the singer on her tour, which features dates from now until September.
Image via Kellie Pickler, Twitter