It’s a snowy and frigid night when members of the Cedar City community gather to celebrate the 30-year birthday of Groovacious, the independently owned and operated record store in Cedar City. The weather may have been cold but the interior of the record store is filled with warmth, both from the store absolutely being packed with people and the love of all those people packing the store and I’m going to tell you why.  

 

Photo/Andrea Wright
Photo/Andrea Wright
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You see, this isn’t just any store. This store and I have a history. When I moved to Cedar City for college in 2000 Tim and Lisa Cretsinger and their store Groovacious also moved to Cedar City. While I was growing up in Vernal there wasn’t always a record store. For a few years while I was a teenager there was one where I gleefully spent my money earned doing yard and maintenance work at an apartment complex. I had a new-found love/obsession with the Moody Blues and grunge music and I needed to hear it all. After that store closed, I had to wait for trips to the malls in Salt Lake City for back-to-school shopping to indulge my new music interests. In fact, it was at one of those malls where I started picking up new age/electronic music albums. Now that you know about my eclectic taste in music, let me tell you more about the shared history of Groovacious and I. 

 

Photo/Tim Cretsinger
Photo/Tim Cretsinger
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My freshman year at SUU I took a radio class and ended up staying involved with the radio station as the music director and host of a new music show until I graduated. It was while I was music director at the radio station that Tim and Lisa started doing their own radio show with the station. Tim and Lisa were very supportive and also helped provide my new music show with the latest new release album to play in full on my show. So, now you know why my history in Cedar City and Groovacious’ are so intertwined. 

Photo/Ashley Goodrich Dixon
Photo/Ashley Goodrich Dixon
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Groovacious has been a part of the Cedar City community for a good chunk of the 30 years they’ve been open, having first opened in Oregon, and has been part of the local music scene. Tim and Lisa hosted open-mic nights, and Tim and Lisa put together Groovefest, a weekend music festival in Cedar City every summer for many, many years. Sadly, cancer claimed Tim in 2016 and Groovefest came to an end. The community grieved with Lisa but Groovacious and the spirit of Tim never really went away. Lisa has kept Groovacious going through grief and a location move that the local music community and I helped with, and has added the art wall and poetry reading to the repertoire of activities that Groovacious contributes to the community. Along with Lisa’s work with Groovacious, she’s added being part of the Iron County Acoustic Music Association to her contributions to the local music scene.  

Photo/Andrea Wright
Photo/Andrea Wright
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Photo/Andrea Wright
Photo/Andrea Wright
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Photo/Andrea Wright
Photo/Andrea Wright
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Photo/Andrea Wright
Photo/Andrea Wright
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Groovacious’ birthday celebration was an evening full of laughs, smiles, tears, and appreciation for a Cedar City institution and hopefully now you know why. 

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