Billy Ray Cyrus Is Engaged, And She’s Barely Older Than Miley

Billy Ray Cyrus is engaged to a 34-year-old singer who goes only by the name Firerose. His daughter Miley will be 30 years old next week (11/23). Cyrus just divorced his wife Tish of over 30 years in April (2023). 

It was 12 years ago, and Billy Ray was on the set of Hannah Montana in Los Angeles when he first met his new fiancee. He told People, "I loved doing that show. There are a couple of old pine trees on the lot that look like Tennessee. Tex [his German Shepard] and I would go out there in the middle of the day, and he'd take care of his business, and we'd stretch, and I'd think how much I missed Tennessee. On that given day, Firerose came out of the front door. There was almost a moment of, I don't know, recognition. I was like, 'This girl's a star.'"

Firerose came over to say hi to Tex. Cyrus recalls, "She told me she'd had an audition, and I said, 'Well, I'm sure you got the job.'" Firerose doesn't remember what she auditioned for, but she did not get the job. Cyrus said he had an idea that day, "I just thought, well, the casting agents, the producers, the writers, they're all on the floor of where we do Hannah Montana. And I actually said to her, 'Don't ever take a strange man up on this offer, but, in this case, Tex will testify that you will be totally safe. I'm going to introduce you to a producer, and you can kind of make yourself at home and watch us rehearse, and you know, maybe it might lead to a role or just another contact at Disney.' And so, off me and her and Tex went back to the studio, and I think she met a lot of the cast and met the producers, writers. And, in some ways, well, in a lot of ways, we became friends."

They stayed in touch, and Firerose asked Billy Ray to hear some of her music. She said, "Our friendship was so solid over the years." He explains, "She plays all of her own instruments and writes her own songs. We began sharing music, and it just evolved." 

In July 2021, they released "New Day," their first song together. Firerose said, "Billy confided in me a lot of what was going on in his life. I was just the best friend I could possibly be, supporting him."

Cyrus and Tish have since finalized their divorce. Billy Ray said of the relationship developing during the pandemic, "There was sickness and death and hard times. All of a sudden, the life that I've always known as a touring artist didn't exist anymore. A moment of so much change. And at the same time, Firerose, who had been such a light of positivity, such a best friend. And then, when we began sharing the music, it just evolved more into, as musical soulmates, to soulmates, happy, pure love that, to me, I didn't know could exist. Again, we're musicians, first and foremost, both of us. And we found this harmony, and this rhythm, this melody to life."

Cyrus proposed to Firerose after she moved into his Tennesse farm. Firerose said, "Billy looked at me and said, 'Do you, do you wanna marry me?' And I was just like, 'Of course I do. I love you,' He said, 'I love you. I wanna make this official. I wanna be with you forever.'"

Billy Ray Cyrus celebrates his 61st birthday today (8/25), and we thought about the impact he had in country music in the early 1990s when he was a superstar with a  smash hit. "Achy Breaky Heart" was one of the reasons the line dance craze began.

To celebrate Billy Ray's big day, we wanted to look at some other superstars that came out of the 1990s.