Dolly Parton has urged Kelly Clarkson to "remember the very best" of her time with Brandon Blackstock.

The 79-year-old music icon has offered some advice to her friends Kelly and Reba McEntire following the death of Blackstock - who was Kelly's ex-husband and Reba's stepson - and touched on her own experiences with grief after her husband Carl Thomas Dean died earlier this year aged 82.

She told Entertainment Tonight: "I think you just have to be grateful for the years that you've had with someone.

"And you just try to remember the very best of all that. And take their energy that they had given you then and kinda just recycle that and let that become a part of you.

"Just honour their memory."

Blackstock - a former music manager turned full-time rancher - died aged 48 from melanoma on 7 August.

His 18-year-old son Seth Blackstock - who he had with first wife Melissa Ashworth Wells - recently took to Instagram to share his devastation at the passing of his beloved father and "best friend".

He wrote on Instagram over the weekend: "I lost my hero yesterday, words can't describe how proud of you I am on raising me and your 3 other kids.

"You were a father, a son, a brother, and most importantly my best friend.

"You'll have to watch me grow up from a Birds Eye view now but that's OK with me. There's no one else on this earth that I would want to be my dad because no one can be half the man you were to me.

"I'll see you everyday when the sun rises and falls. I can confidently say all the deer and elk took a sigh of relief when the best hunter I've ever known laid his rifle down for the last time."

He concluded: "I love you so much and can't wait to throw a line in the water with you again. Love you dad. Be good or good at it -love your son Seth."

Kelly, 43, is yet to address his death publicly.

She and Blackstock were married for seven years before divorcing in 2022, and despite their split, Kelly prioritised his relationship with their two children, River Rose, 11, and Remington, nine, rearranging her schedule to allow them frequent visits during his illness.

A source has now told UsWeekly about how she is dealing wit the fallout from his death from cancer: "It has been draining, exhausting, emotional (and) devastating.

"(But) her children have always come first.

"A big part of (her care for Brandon) was making her schedule available for transporting the children to visit Brandon."