Neil Giraldo has sold over 35 million albums with his musical partner and wife Pan Benatar. His latest project is Three Chord Bourbon, a sprits company designed to give back to the music community.
Since the opening guitar riff of 1979’s ‘Heartbreaker,’ Neil Giraldo has been adding his signature guitar sound to the hits of his musical partner and wife Pat Benatar for over 40 years, selling over 35 million albums in the process. He’s also written, played on and produced songs for Kenny Loggins, John Waite and Rick Springfield — that’s his guitar playing heard on the iconic hit ‘Jesse’s Girl.’ I spoke with Giraldo about his latest project Three Chord Bourbon, and discussed why he wanted to try his hand at making his favorite spirit and why he wanted to make sure the brand benefited musicians everywhere. You were raised in a Sicilian Household. Did you grow up with wine? My parents are Sicilian-American. Wine is a beverage in Italian culture. It’s drunk in the morning, the afternoon, the evening. Not a lot, everything is in moderation. My mother always had this little tiny glass of wine at dinnertime. But on weekends that glass would come out at 11 in the morning. My neighbor used to make his own wine and grappa and he had a little too much fun with it, so he’d fall off the stoop. My mom would tell me « go get Mr. Jimmy off the stoop. » So I’d have to go and pick him up and then he would give me a glass of wine. Were you allowed a tiny glass of wine as well? Well it’s a terrible thing but when I was young I used to take toothpicks and put them in crème de menthe and I would take them to school and I’d be able to suck on them. But truthfully I had very low blood pressure and was sick as a child almost every day of my life. Music was the only thing that saved myself from disintegrating. I went to the doctor at 8 years old and he said “you have low blood pressure and you have to have a little bit of wine very day.” And he told me to eat more garlic. Do you still enjoy wine? I do, but I really like to have spirits to engage with food. That’s important to me. Usually I stop drinking everything after dinner except maybe a little grappa.
