Brooke Eden: 'She's in Love With the Girl' Was Trisha's Idea

Brooke Eden and Trisha Yearwood made headlines with a Grand Ole Opry performance in late June, during which they changed the lyrics to Yearwood's 1991 classic "She's in Love With the Boy" to "she's in love with the girl."

The switch to reflect Eden's own love story, the singer says, was all Yearwood's idea.

Yearwood called Eden a few weeks before that June 25 performance with the plan. Per Eden, Yearwood says she often has LGBTQ+ fans tell her that they change the song — Yearwood's first career single, and her first chart-topper — to "she's in love with the girl" or "he's in love with the boy."

"She was like, 'It's Pride Month, you and Hilary [Hoover, Eden's longtime girlfriend and now-fiancée] just got engaged. I would love to do something with you at the Opry where we switch the words around,'" Eden recalls. "And my first response was, 'Are you sure?'"

Eden knows her fans are accepting of her sexuality and her relationship — she shares photos of herself and Hoover on social media, and even had Hoover star with her in a recent series of music videos — but Yearwood "[is] a country music icon ... [and has] a lot of, you know, old-school fans."

Yearwood, though, wouldn't hear it.

"She's like, 'Girl, this is country music — we're a community; we love each other. And I support your love just as much as I support my love. And I want to say something about that,'" Eden remembers Yearwood telling her. Yearwood also told Eden she thought the response would be "really great," and that "anyone who doesn't like it, they can go."

"I was like, wow, that's like such a strong [person] to have as an ally for the community. And I started bawling," Eden shares, "and then I was like, 'Let's do it.'"

Indeed, Eden and Yearwood's performance turned out to be a big deal, in a very positive way. The two had talked out how it would go, but Eden says Yearwood's speech to the Opry crowd and her decision to change the couple in the song's names from Katie and Tommy to Brooke and Hilary were surprises.

"I'm just so grateful that our genre has icons like Trisha Yearwood, who is willing to stand up for love and be an ally to the LGBTQ community," says Eden, who knows Yearwood well, as Hoover works with both Yearwood and her husband, Garth Brooks.

"They're such special people, and I'm so, so happy to know them," she adds. "Everyone says like don't meet your heroes. Those two — no, you want to meet your heroes. They're even cooler than you could expect them to be."

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