About Cheryl...
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It all started one evening when Cheryl and her family were visiting some friends on a farm in Stillwater, Minnesota. The hosts had a piano and Cheryl loved to play it (she was barely four years old). During one of these visits, she happened to play a familiar tune. That's when the realization came that maybe she had some talent!
At Christmas, her dad brought home a toy piano for Cheryl, and a guitar for her older brother Gary. At five years of age, Cheryl graduated to her first real piano – a Story & Clark spinet piano purchased at the Minnesota State Fairgrounds. She still has both pianos today! The piano lessons started at age six. Cheryl took classical piano with tutors at St. Josephs Academy in St. Paul, MN, and in-home lessons until the age of eleven. (The sad and sudden death of her last tutor ended formal training.)
Cheryl also learned to play the flute at eight years of age, and during her high school years she won 1st Place state and regional competitions with classical compositions. She played the baritone saxophone in stage band at Monroe High School, St. Paul, Minnesota.
At 16, Cheryl started playing in local rock bands in her hometown of St. Paul, Minnesota. Her father belonged to the Honeywell Country Club in Golden Valley, MN, where she and her drummer friend Lee Brandenburg played several gigs. (OK, it doesnt hurt to have contacts!) Cheryl also taught Wurlitzer organ/piano lessons and became involved in sales for some years before landing her first steady singing job at CC Richards Supper Club in White Bear Lake, Minnesota, when she was 23.
After signing with Comstock Records in 1986, Cheryl recorded several of her own compositions in Nashville, (I Dont Love You Enough - To Miss You When You're Gone, for example) charting the Top Ten Peugeot Playbill in England and the Top 35 Independent Country Charts in the United States.
Cheryl moved to Hilton Head Island, South Carolina, in June of 1987. Before settling in South Carolina, she traveled extensively throughout Europe, singing and entertaining at nightclubs and hotels. She has entertained audiences in the Southeast for more than 20 years... from the parties of her dear friend Awesome Lawson Hamilton at the Greenbrier Hotel in West Virginia, to The Summerhouse in Sarasota Florida, to The Mansion in Savannah Georgia, Palmetto Bluff, etc.
She was co-owner of The Casablanca Piano Bar on Hilton Head Island from 1988 to 1991, before opening her own establishment called Cheryl's Le Cabaret Piano Bar in June of 1991. It was a wonderful place where locals and visitors alike would come to enjoy Cheryl and her guest singers and musicians, dance, imbibe, and have great conversation. Many people, including Cheryl, still talk about many of the wonderful memories they had there. Couples met there and have since married. Cheryl even married a couple there herself, whom she still keeps in contact with! There were many regular guest singers that people loved to talk about!!! Minnesota Bill, Abbie, Marvin the Monkey, Pocono Bob, Stan the Man, Awesome Lawson, Elvis, Moss Weber, Sunny, Big Jim – the list goes on and on. Health issues forced Cheryl to sell the business instead of signing another five year lease. Cheryl is a cancer survivor.
After selling Le Cabaret in October 2001, Cheryl took time off to travel and to attend the Savannah College of Art and Design in the field of Film and Video Production. She worked in production at WHHI-TV Channel 3 on Hilton Head for over three years, taping and editing shows, conducting interviews, and on-location shoots. She now has her own videography business and has created hundreds of story albums on DVD – from family reunions, birthday parties, video messages, cooking shows, documentaries, vacation stories and family albums to pet stories and baby stories. Cheryl has created many music videos!
The latest endeavor for Cheryl is the new company she and her partners (Mark & Lise Husbands, Jeffrey Borthick) have formed called Mood Music Media Company. Cheryls passion for animals is high on her list. Her latest CD releases, Gone For a Walk Mood Music For Dogs (And Dog Lovers), and Ball of Twine Mood Music For Cats (And Cat Lovers), combine Cheryls two passions, (music and animals), with soft beautiful relaxing music through grand piano, strings, harp and flute – all with music she composed.
Cheryls mother suffers from Alzheimer's disease, and her father is the "36 hour" caretaker. To those whose lives have been touched by this disease, you know how devastating this process can be. Cheryl has decided to donate a percentage of the proceeds of her Gone For a Walk, & Ball of Twine CDs to the Alzheimers Research Foundation Fisher Center. They work hard to find the cause and cure for this disease.
Of course, a percentage
of the proceeds also go to ASPCA The
American Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. Hopefully, we all are well
aware of the horrible abuse and abandonment of animals in this country.
Cheryl supports this charity. She volunteered for the Jasper County
Animal Shelter for three years and has seen first hand some of the terrible
abuse and situations of these cats and dogs.
Five things you might not know about Cheryl
1. She's a country girl at heart. One of her favorite things to do is
spend the day gardening and mowing the lawn on the tractor mower!
2. Shes most comfortable in a baseball cap and a pair of jeans
3. She loves her old 1978 Buick Riviera
4. She used to compete in car racing
5. She once thought about being an oceanographer - loves scuba diving
with Jeff
