How heartbreaking family tragedies shaped Luke Bryan’s career

8 August 2025, 11:55

The ‘All My Friends Say’ singer has had to deal with several tragic events while pursuing his music career.

Luke Bryan is one of country music’s 21st-century success stories.

The five-time ACM Awards Entertainer of the Year winner is much-loved for hit songs like ‘Country Girl’, ‘Play It Again’, and ‘Strip It Down’.

But personal tragedy once almost prevented Luke from pursuing a career in music.

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In 1996, after discovering his passion for music as a teen, a 19-year-old Luke was preparing to leave his Georgia home to try his luck in Nashville, Tennessee.

But his best laid plans were put on hold after his older brother Chris was killed in a car accident just before Luke was planning to leave.

“I didn’t spend time on ‘Should I go or should I not?’” Luke recalled in a 2013 interview with People magazine (via Taste of Country).

“It was just ‘Not going.’ [My] mother had just lost a child. At that point her youngest son was not going to leave the house. Chris’ dying got me a little more mature,” he added.

Unwilling to leave his family at their time of grief, Luke put his musical ambitions to the side and remained in his home state for several years, during which he studied business administration at Georgia Southern University.

It took until 2001 for Luke to be convinced by his father – on whose peanut farm he had been working since graduating – that he should follow his dream and move to Nashville after all.

After a few years working as a songwriter for other artists in the Music City, Luke was ready to establish himself as a country star in his own right when tragedy struck once again mere months before the release of his debut studio album.

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In May 2007, Luke's older sister Kelly – his last remaining sibling – passed away at home unexpectedly from unknown causes.

“They never determined what happened. The autopsies, the coroner, no one could figure it out,” Luke told People in 2013.

“Losing my brother changed me tremendously and losing Kelly, even more,” he continued. “I literally do not take one second for granted.”

The singer found strength and comfort at this time in his Christian faith, as well as from his extended family.

“Your faith has to get you through all that,” he shared. “That’s not saying you don’t question it. But you just have to revert back to your faith in God’s plan, that you’ll be together again and that’s what you have to go on.”

Luke later channelled some of his grief into making music, his tracks ‘Drink A Beer’ and ‘Songs You Never Heard’ being his most notable tributes to his lost siblings.

In 2014, Luke’s family endured more tragedy when the singer’s brother-in-law, Kelly’s husband, Ben Lee Cheshire, died suddenly in November.

Leaving his and Kelly’s three children orphaned, Luke and his wife Caroline adopted their nephew Til, then 13, and became guardians for their nieces Kris, then 16, and Jordan, then 20.

“We never thought twice about it,” Caroline told Good Morning America in 2017. “You know, it was never something that he and I had to sit down and talk about: ‘Should we take this on?’ We just did.”

Having suffered so many personal tragedies throughout his adult life, Luke hopes his endurance of his life’s toughest trials inspires others to hold on during tough times in their own lives.

“We feel like if we just stay positive through this, maybe we'll be a positive inspiration for people that had these things happen to 'em,” Luke told GMA.

“You just have to plough on and play the hand that's dealt... I have to pray that people that have had similar situations can maybe look at my family and see me positively dealing with it.”

“I'm not saying it's easy,” he conceded, but his message was clear: that there is a way to find hope and continue through life, even when dealt some of the world’s toughest challenges.