this band received the National Traditional Country Music Association's coveted "Rising Legend Award."  Dick Kimmel & Co's traditional style of bluegrass is laced with old-time string band music, original songs that seem like classics, bluegrass gospel, and traditional country duets.   

Dick Kimmel, who resides in New Ulm, Minnesota, has been performing bluegrass music since the 1950's.  With his band, Dick handles lead and harmony vocals in addition to playing guitar.  (Occasionally, he will also pick up a mandolin or his clawhammer banjo.)  Dick has recorded more than 2-dozen albums, including 7 CD's for Copper Creek Records, a Virginia-based bluegrass music record label.  His Copper Creek solo recordings include a 1996 release,  "Dick Kimmel ‑ 25 Year Collection" (Copper Creek Records CD‑0143), "Dick Kimmel ‑ Wild Turkey Rag" (Copper Creek Records CD‑0115) released in 1992, and his 2000 clawhammer banjo release, "Dick Kimmel ‑ Fishin' Creek Blues" (Copper Creek Records CD‑0173).  In a November 1994 feature article, Bluegrass Unlimited referred to Dick as the “ambassador of bluegrass.”  On stage, Dick's emcee work paints a picture of bluegrass music and its colorful history from information he gained as a writer for international bluegrass music magazines.  Dick Kimmel is a 2008 inductee into America's Old-Time Country Music Hall of Fame. 

Vocalist Jerilyn Kjellberg has been a regular in the Dick Kimmel & Co lineup since 2002.  She shared a major lead vocal role for the band's latest recordings ("Dick Kimmel & Co - My Lord Keeps a Record"--Copper Creek Records CD-0240).  Jerilyn's singing received rave reviews and the CD earned recognition as a candidate for Gospel Recorded Performance of the Year for 2005 by the International Bluegrass Music Association.  For a 2003 article for Inside Bluegrass, Len Kalakian wrote: "Here is a voice that deserves to be heard...her voice and vocal styling has a quality about it that makes it memorable."  Jerilyn is a master at expressing the essence of a song, ranging in style from her soft and sensitive treatment of "Tramp on the Street" to a hard-driving bluegrass standard like "Midnight Train."   A January 2010 concert review  regarding Jerilyn's vocals noted, "...a powerful smooth voice and an energy that was electric."  (Applewood  Pointe of View, January 2010).

Tim O'Connor has been playing 5-string banjo and guitar for more than 40 years.  Tim has been performing and recording with Dick Kimmel & Co since 2001 and is featured on banjo, guitar, and lead and harmony vocals on the band's 2005 recording, "Dick Kimmel & Co - My Lord Keeps A Record."  This Renville, Minnesota musician discovered 5-string banjo during the 1960's.  Bluegrass music became his music of choice when he first heard a recording of Lester Flatt and Earl Scruggs.  His banjo playing has been described as solidly Scruggs style, but with an appropriate melodic touch.   

Bruce Bernhart, from Owatonna, MN, has played bluegrass mandolin for 2 decades with various artists including String Fever and Loraine Clark.  Bruce’s mandolin work with Dick Kimmel & Co is both energetic and thoughtful, and gives the listener a taste of true bluegrass mandolin artistry.  In addition, Bruce adds the bass vocals to Dick Kimmel & Co's gospel quartets and his unique sense of humor to the band's show.   Inside Bluegrass (December 2009) noted, "Bruce drives a band with his strong chop and exciting mandolin breaks."

Lee Folta was a long-time member of the Texas-based The Bluegrass Solution prior to his 2007 move to Minnesota, when he joined Dick Kimmel & Co.  Having been born in Kentucky, Lee was strongly influenced by the abundance of bluegrass found in bluegrass music's heartland.  He began playing guitar in the 1960's.  His solid bass playing with Dick Kimmel & Co is strongly influenced by his rare and powerful original 1938 Kay 5-string bass.   Inside Bluegrass (December 2009) noted that Lee's "playing is tastefully basic, a very important aspect of traditional music that many bass players, who wish they were playing a lead instrument, often forget."

Comments About This Band:

"Dick Kimmel & Co is absolutely rock-solid, professional Look for Dick Kimmel & Co on posters as festival season next year begins to roll around.  Go to support the festival, but go especially to see and hear this band perform.  If you have even the slightest reverence for the style of bluegrass we have inherited from the first generation greats and beyond, you will walk away at evening's end humming and singing this band's songs and looking for more festival posters."  Len Kalakian, Inside Bluegrass, December 2009.

"Dick has assembled a fine band with wonderfully blended vocal harmonies and instrumentation ranging from hard-driving to softly melodic. With the deeply heartfelt vocals and stirring messages of hope and redemption, it's hard to believe that the band has never recorded a gospel album before. Jerilyn's rendition of 'Tramp on the Street' has a poignancy and sensitivity that few singers can muster. Definitely a must for fans of well done gospel music."  California Bluegrass Association web site, July 2005

"Tops in bluegrass - internationally traveled"  Mountain Music Showbarn, Custer, SD, July 1996.

"They played at the Copper Grid in Madison, Wisconsin, to a standing room only crowd of bluegrass fans...the band played and sang hard driving, straight forward bluegrass music liberally sprinkled with stories and laugher...After two encores, the crowd reluctantly let them close the show."  Carmen Burnett, Fireball Mail, May-June 2000.