Update on Charlie Daniels
Category: Bluegrass News
By Dan Tackett
January 21, 2010
Fiddler-guitarist and bandleader Charlie Daniels has some stiffness and numbness in his left hand and arm after suffering a mild stroke while snowmobiling in Colorado, according to several sources.
Daniels, 73, suffered the stroke Friday just outside Durango. He was treated at a local hospital then airlifted to a Denver hospital, where he was released on Sunday.
On his Web site, Daniels said he was starting physical therapy. He didn’t say whether his playing had been affected but wrote, “I’m doing fine.”
Another statement on the Web site says he doesn’t plan to cancel any concerts. His next appearance with The Charlie Daniels Band is scheduled for Feb. 27 in Fort Pierce, Fla.
Charlie Daniels lives in Mount Juliet, Tenn., but has a home in the Durango area where he takes an extended vacation every year around Christmas, his spokeswoman Paula Szeigis said.
Szeigis said Daniels has returned to the Durango home.
In his posting, Daniels said he was snowmobiling with friends when he noticed his left hand getting numb but thought it was because he had been gripping the handlebars for so long.
“But then I felt the left side of my mouth starting growing numb and my left foot started getting hard to control and I knew something was happening to me. I knew I’d better get back down the mountain and get some help,” he wrote.
He said tests showed the stroke was caused by a blood clot in his brain.
“The fingerprints of God were all over my experience,” Charlie Daniels wrote, because he wasn’t far from the Durango hospital, which had only recently begun stocking the drug used to break up the clot. A plane was immediately available to take him to Denver.
Related Links
Charlie Daniels
Charlie Daniels’ Message to Fans
• Charlie Daniels

