Jake Owen Covers ‘The Dance’ and Talks Divorce On Stage [Watch]

Sadly, Jake Owen announced that he and his wife of 3 years, Lacey, were divorcing via social media on Friday, August 7.

Owen tweeted a statement out saying,

“I wanted to let my fans know how much I’ve appreciated their support not only of my career, but my family as a whole. Sadly, Lacey and I have decided to end our marriage. We want to focus on our daughter Pearl and make sure that she has a beautiful life with loving parents. We appreciate you respecting our privacy during this time.”

 

Jake hit the stage at WE Fest in Minnesota over the weekend and after having some technical difficulties, grabbed his guitar and did an acoustic version of Garth Brooks’ ‘The Dance.’

You can hear him stop in the middle and open up about the split -

“I think maybe a lot of people would maybe shy away from it, but I’ve been going through something really sad in my life... my wife and I are getting a divorce and this is probably the hardest shit I’ve ever done in my life. To walk on stage every night and try to pretend like everything is awesome when it really ain’t always awesome, ya know what I’m saying?”

 

“But thanks to people like you guys for singing along. You have no idea how much you guys life me up every single night and I love my wife more than anything in the world, and I love my little baby girl Pearl more than anything in the world, and if it wasn’t for both of them, I wouldn’t even be here right now a happy man. That’s a dance I’m glad I got to dance and I”m glad you guys got to sing it with me tonight.”

 

Because it's a cell phone video, you can also hear comments from the crowd about all the recent divorces in country music, and how sad Jake's heartfelt message has made some of them.