Cherryholmes appears with Ralph Stanley & The Clinch Mountain Boys at the Poway Center for the Performing Arts 10/24

When Jere (pronounced Jerry) and Sandy Cherryholmes' 20-year-old daughter, Shelly, unexpectedly died from respiratory failure due to chronic heart problems, the immediate concern was how to help their four remaining children and themselves cope with the pain.

"We needed something to lift our spirits," Sandy Cherryholmes recalls, "Something to draw the family closer together."

With no other motive than to try and find some respite from their grief, the family attended a bluegrass music festival close to their home town of Bell, California. Afterward, Jere Cherryholmes said to his wife, "You know, what we really need right now is to do something special with our kids. Let's start a bluegrass group." So Sandy Cherryholmes, a church piano player, and her bass playing husband, taught their four kids the guitar, banjo, fiddle and drums, using music to help dissolve sorrow into renewed hope.

That much in itself is a remarkable story--how a mom who home-schooled her kids, along with her carpenter husband, prevented their family from falling apart by binding it together with music. For instead of teaching each of their children to become soloists, Jere and Sandy Cherryholmes guided their kids into becoming a family of musicians who needed one another to succeed. When you add to that the fact that today, just a little over 10 years since Shelly's death, Cherryholmes has become one of the most sought-after and famous bluegrass groups in the world, the story sounds like a fairy tale. Yet, it is absolutely true.

Known for its "...mesmerizing presence...a cold blast of virtuosity..." (New York Times), Cherryholmes combines non-stop "...twin fiddles, Irish step-dancing, classic country yodeling (and) old-time claw hammer banjo..." creating a style of playing described by Jere Cherryholmes as "Bluegrass on steroids."

But perhaps it is Jere's simple musical philosophy that fashioned Cherryholmes' unique style of bluegrass and made them the must-see, must-hear bluegrass band:

"I heard someone say that bluegrass music has to change or evolve, or it will die," says Jere. "I don't think it needs to be changed. It just needs new breath."

On October 24, 2009, at 8 pm, the audience at the PowayCenter for the Performing Arts will have it's breath taken away by this monster bluegrass concert in what promises to be an evening of spectacular bluegrass music. Especially with Ralph Stanley and The Clinch Mountain Boys also performing that evening.
Stanley, considered bluegrass royalty and a cornerstone of the bluegrass world, was inducted into the International Bluegrass Music Hall of Honor in 1992 and in 2000 became the first person in the third millennium to be inducted into the Grand Ole Opry.

In 2000 he deservedly rose to national prominence when his music was featured in the movie Oh Brother, Where Art Thou? "O Death," a track from the movie, resulted in Stanley winning a Grammy for Best Male Country Vocal Performance.

He also is known for playing audiences like a fiddle, raising the little hairs on the back of an audience's neck, then making them want to roll up the carpet and start dancing.

Cherryholmes and Ralph Stanley & The Clinch Mountain Boys, a musical double-header in which the audience comes out the big winner.

The 2009-2010 Professional Performance Season is made possible by the City of Poway, San Diego National Bank, Jane & Tim McCarthy, San Diego Foundation's Betsy Dam Fund for Arts Education, Theodore & Elizabeth Schmidt Foundation, McCarthy-Goldsmith Theater Fund, Duffy Family Foundation, Todd & Mari Gutschow Family Foundation, Echo Pacific Construction, Inc., National Endowment for the Arts, County of San Diego, Sempra Energy, Penny & Harold Dokmo, The Pentair Foundation, Mandell Weiss Charitable Trust, Samuel I. & John Henry Fox Foundation, Pratt Memorial Fund, Martin Sosin-Stratton Petit Foundation, Carol and Bill Stensrud Family Foundation, Rancho Financial, Winton Larson & Solecki LLP, Replica, KSDS Jazz-88.3, North County Times, ER Management, Courtyard by Marriott-Rancho Bernardo.

About the Poway Center for the Performing Arts Foundation: The Poway Center for the Performing Arts Foundation functions through a special partnership with the City of Poway and the Poway Unified School District. The Foundation is governed by a volunteer board of directors and advised by a business council that reads like a "Who's Who" of Inland North County civic leaders. The Foundation offers a variety of professional performing arts events including concerts, dance performances, Theater Productions and a children's theater series that includes workshops and study guides. Visit our website at www.powayarts.org.

 

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