Cherry Rhodes, Adjunct Professor of Organ Studies at the University of Southern California, is a graduate of the Curtis Institute of Music,
where she studied under Alexander McCurdy.
The recipient of Fulbright and Rockefeller grants, she studied in Munich and Paris with Karl Richter, Marie-Claire Alain and Jean Guillou.
She was the first American to win an international organ competition (Munich, 1966). She has played recitals at Notre Dame in Paris and at
international organ festivals in Bratislava and Presov, Freiburg, Munich, Nurnberg, Paris, St. Albans, Luxembourg, Vienna and throughout Poland.
She made her musical debut at age 17, when she appeared with the Philadelphia Orchestra and subsequently with the South German Radio Orchestra, the Chamber Orchestra of the French National Radio, the Pasadena Chamber Orchestra, the Los Angeles Philharmonic and the Phoenix Symphony. Ms. Rhodes is a frequent performer at national conventions of the American Guild of Organists, including four recitals at the 1996 Centennial Convention held in New York City. As an international performer, she has given recitals at Royal Festival Hall in London, Lincoln Center in New York City, Kennedy Center in Washington dc, Orchestra Hall in Chicago, Meyerson Symphony Center in Dallas and the Performing Arts Center in Milwaukee. Ms. Rhodes frequently adjudicates national and international competitions. She was the co-editor for Variations on Old Hundredth by Calvin Hampton (Wayne Leupold Editions, Inc.) and editor for Ascent by Joan Tower (Associated Music Publishers, Inc.).
Her recordings include Everyone Dance (Pro Organo label) and Comes Summertime (jav Recordings), and she contributed a few selections by Clarence Mader to the compilation Pipedreams Live (Minnesota Public Radio).