DAVE SHERIFF was born in the heart of the country on the Doverdale Estate near Droitwich in Worcestershire, England where his father worked as a gamekeeper. The family then moved to the Reading area in Berkshire where Dave made his first public appearance at Bradfield Village Hall back in 1958 playing the harmonica, beginning a lifetime fascination of playing musical instruments. He was educated at Chiltern Edge Secondary Modern School, Sonning Common where he was an active member of the school choir. After teaching himself to play the drums, he progressed to guitar, and then started playing all three instruments together to become a very popular club act, and a world famous ‘One Man Band’ having no less than nine entries in the Guinness Book of Records between 1982 and 1989. This led to TV appearances in Hilversum Holland, Rome Italy and Helsinki Finland as well as two appearances with Roy Castle on BBC TVs 'Record Breakers' in London, and personal appearances on the European Record Breakers tour in Grenoble France, Fak am see Austria and Copenhagen, Denmark.
During the 1970s, he worked as a session musician playing harmonica and keyboards on TV shows with Kelvin Henderson and Pete Sayers and whilst working at the prestigious Wembley Country Music Festivals in London, worked with top American Country Artistes Don Gibson, Dennis 'McCloud' Weaver, Ronnie Prophet, Carole Baker, Dave & Sugar and the Nashville Superpickers which included Lloyd Green, Charlie McCoy, Johnny Gimble and Pig Robbins which led to more TV appearances on the BBC series 'Sing Country' from Snape Maltings in Suffolk.
He also toured with 'Cowboys Sweetheart' Patsy Montana and Country legend Slim Whitman on his 1977 tour.
In the 1980s, Dave was 'discovered' playing at a Midlands talent showcase by entrepreneur Bernie Burgess (an ex member of the legendary Jones Boys) who molded his 'one man band' musical act into that of a polished cabaret performer. It was thanks to Bernie that Dave received the 'Midlands Musical Entertainer' award at the New Cresta Club in Solihull in 1981.
Another TV appearance followed in 1984 when he was cast as Country Singer 'Whispering Fred Jones' in the long running ITV soap 'Emmerdale Farm'.
He began writing and recording in 1991 and his debut CD album ‘One Man Band Extraordinaire, which contained sixteen of his own songs, was awarded ‘Best Album’ at the 1993 ‘UK Country Music Radio Awards’.
Finding it almost impossible to get a recording deal, he decided to form his own recording and publishing company ‘Stomp Music’, and now has an impressive catalogue of CDs containing the many songs he has written.
Dave has recorded many of his songs in Nashville, working with the very musicians responsible for creating that very distinctive 'Nashville Sound' - Pig Robbins, Buddy Spicher, Pete Wade, Leon Rhodes and Buddy Emmons have all contributed to Dave's music and the legendary 'Jordanaires' who can be heard providing background vocals on so many hit records from artistes such as Elvis Presley, Patsy Cline, Marty Robbins and Jim Reeves, can also be heard on Dave's album 'Dave Sheriff in Nashville' which also includes a duet with Grand Ole Opry star Porter Wagoner.
The highlight of Dave’s career has to be singing at the world famous Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, USA where he was invited to appear in June 2000 by Porter Wagoner.
Dave returned to Nashville in September 2005 to start recording the highly acclaimed ’Overworked & Underpaid’ album. Included in this album is the song ‘I wish I had a Bassman like The Jordanaires’ which is a tribute to tremendous contribution made by the group to the music business stretching right back to 1950s - they claim to have backed over 3000 artistes during their career!
Three singles from the album (including the above) have reached the Number one position in the British Country Music charts