Who is Distillery Dave?
    Distillery Dave was born in Greenville, South Carolina on September 18, 1946 to Wilton and Edna Leapard.  His father was a grocer and his mother the operator of a Woolworth lunch counter for many years.   Dave's first public performance was in 1951 when, at the age of 5, he appeared on the Bob Poole Show on WESC in Greenville and sung "It's Sweet to be Remembered" and "Hey Good Lookin'"  According to Dave's wife, Barbara, "He's been performing pretty much ever since."
     A few years ago, when the karaoke craze began to catch on, Dave started singing in the karaoke bars of Toledo, in particular, at the Distillery.  As he made the rounds of the local karaoke circuit he often encountered more than one singer named Dave so, to set
himself apart from the rest, he started using the name "Distillery Dave."  A frequent contestant in Toledo karaoke contests, Dave won a recording session at Big Mama's Recording Studio.  With that prize he recorded his first album, Contemporary Country Classics, Volume 1.  It included songs of George Strait, Trace Adkins, Gary Allen, Aaron Tippin, and others.  He has recorded 4 additional albums since.  In compiling his albums Dave attempts to bridge the gap between Traditional and Contemporary Country Music.  According to Dave, "You don't have to hate Blake Shelton to love Conway Twitty."  The song selection on his albums is a direct reflection of that philosophy.
    In his day job Dave is a Professor of Business & Marketing Education at Eastern Michigan University in Ypsilanti, MI.  He and his wife Barbara live in the Mich-Ohio border town of Sylvania, OH.  They have two daughters; Sara Saunders of Hamilton, Ohio and Emily, a recent graduate of the University of Toledo who lives with them in Sylvania.  Last Fall Sara and husband Dustin presented Dave with his first grandchild, Charles David.  In recent years Dave has performed at the Renfo Valley Entertainment Center in Mount Vernon, KY and more recently at Jamin' in the Valley in Clearfield, PA.  He maintains an active web presence with www.numberonemusic.com, www.cdbaby.com, and can be heard on the web at http://www.isound.com/distillery_dave and at http:/www.supercountryradio.com.  All of his songs can be purchased at CDBaby or go to iTunes and enter "Distillery Dave" in the Search Box.  iTunes permits individual song purchases at 99 cents per download.