Blake Shelton
Blake Shelton was born on June 18, 1976, in Ada, Oklahoma. He wrote songs as a teenager and honed his performing style as he played honky-tonk bars and became a regular on a local country music show. He received statewide attention when he won the Denbo Diamond Award, the top award for young Oklahoma entertainers. Two weeks out of high school in 1994, he packed his guitar and headed for Nashville. His first few years there were spent writing songs. In 2001, Blake Shelton released his self-titled debut album. One of the songs on the album, "Austin", stayed at #1 on Billboard's singles chart for six weeks, tying Billy Ray Cyrus' record for a debut single. He wasted no time recording a sophomore release. "The Dreamer" appeared in February, 2003 and "Baby" was another multi-week #1 hit. In 2004, he released the studio album "Blake Shelton's Barn & Grill", which included another #1 hit "Some Beach". Shelton has also had many #1 videos, including "Ol' Red", “Heavy Liftin”, "Some Beach", "Goodbye Time" and "Nobody But Me". His "Blake Shelton's Barn & Grill" video has been certified gold. His first three albums have sold over 2.5 million copies. In 2006, Blake Shelton moved back to his home state of Oklahoma, declaring Nashville a place where he "could never get totally comfortable. It's just way to big for me". He immediately began working on his fourth album "Pure BS" which is set for release in May, 2007. He has already released "Don't Make Me" as a video and it didn't take long to reach #1 on CMT. Blake Shelton feels that he has matured a lot and he feels that his success as an artist isn't being king of the mountain but that his albums last forever and are ones that people never throw away.

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