Diane Vanette, the author of Cherry Sisters Music City, beat her twin brother into the world by a few minutes. And, frankly, never slowed down.
Growing up in smaller communities in Pennsylvania, her father, a physician and her mother working as his practice nurse, moved the family to Nashville when she was starting high school. Her love of music and her activity playing piano, flute and singing in her church choir made the move to Nashville a little less hard for the teenage Diane.
She found a home in the Marching Band at Isaac Litton High School and her high school made the trip to the mecca of the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade and the Tournament of Roses Parade.
Neighbors in her area of Nashville included Grand Ole Opry performers and studio musicians. And, in the small- town world of 1960s Nashville she would come to know her neighbors and they influenced her decision not to follow her parents into healthcare, but to chart a course in music, enrolling in the George Peabody Music School which has since become a part of Vanderbilt University.
In the 1960s, the campus music school was in the historic and iconic Social Religious Building, noted for its large dome and was a matter of a block from 16th Avenue South and a short walk down 16th took you to every recording studio the growing Music City had to offer. Diane had only to walk down the street to find herself in the heart of the record business.
While she briefly followed an opportunity with The Nashville Symphony and after turning down a teaching position in the public schools, Diane launched herself into the world of studio musician and singer.
Finding work in the studios was competitive. There was a lot of talent landing in Nashville. What Diane learned was that earning the gig was frequently a function of who you knew. The fact that she was a High School Nashville girl with neighbors in the music industry was helpful. That she had a music degree from Peabody helped also. She would find that her talent, discipline and willingness to take direction would make her marketable. She also found that, while she was a skilled musician, she found work as a backup vocalist. These gigs would take her both into the studio and provide travel opportunities with road tours, one taking her to the Ed Sullivan Show as a vocalist with Danny Davis.
She also realized that being an independent contractor, paid by the gig, meant that finances could be uneven and that traditional employment benefits, like health insurance were non-existent. By 1966, Diane was an activist member helping AFTRA emerge in Nashville, in a state not known to be friendly to unions. She remains a SAG- AFTRA member to this day.
By 1974, Diane had been in the music industry for a while. But it would be a chance booking for a gig that would bring her together with two other studio backup singers, Lisa Silver and Sheri Kramer that would change the direction of her career. It took only the one session for the women to realize that they had a special something. And within a few months, arranger Bill Justis would refer to them as the “Cherry Sisters” as a joke as they were clearly anything but terrible and the name stuck. Over the next 10 years, the Cherry Sisters became backup vocalists for virtually every producer in Nashville and almost all the major stars recording in every genre. They went on world-wide tours with Charlie Rich and Jerry Read and frequently appeared on stage with artists and on television shows.
In 1984, Fred Foster, owner of Monument Records, would sign the trio to a recording contract, and wheels were put in motion to emerge the Cherry Sisters as stars in their own right. The debut album tracks were recorded, publicity photos were done and then….. the label bankrupted.
Diane would eventually leave the recording industry, returning to school to earn a degree in Psychology and becoming a Marriage and Family Therapist in Los Angeles, where she moved with her husband. The Cherry Sisters would remain very close friends over the following 35+ years, getting together often, sometimes reprising their unique sound in the studio for artists.
Diane was lured back to Middle Tennessee by her grandchildren, Max and Emmerson Tidwell who live with her son, Darren and his wife, Amy in Nashville. Diane and her husband, along with Madonna, their dog, split their time between Franklin and Los Angeles where she has been writing Cherry Sisters Music City.
