Little Jimmy: Big Talent, Lots of Love

I married into a musical family. My brother-in-law and sister-in-law have been playing in bands at local clubs for some 30 years. So when they began telling me about a 12-year-old guitar prodigy from Point Pleasant that they'd been working with, I didn't think much of it, until I heard them all play together Friday night at The Stone Pony in Asbury Park. 

It was a launch party for Little Jimmy and The Midnight Son's first CD. Grateful Dead vocalist Donna Jean Godchaux sings backup vocals on the CD, and two members of her band played Friday night. 

"I've been into the Grateful Dead all my life," said Little Jimmy's father Jimmy Lawroski, when I spoke to him by phone Monday.

"It was always around the house.  It was constantly on. ...It's weird because [Jimmy] is so young and he still loves the Grateful Dead," he said.

Midnight Son played a few Dead songs, but they mostly played original tunes composed by Little Jimmy and my brother-in-law, Wayne Scheller. Lowroski had been telling Wayne that his son could play guitar for a while and said Wayne took him about as seriously as any of us would until one day Wayne was playing at Jenk's Inlet Bar in Point Pleasant Beach and he invited Little Jimmy to sit in with him on a song.

Wayne and Little Jimmy began jamming and writing together and Wayne noticed that Jimmy had perfect pitch, Lawroski said.

"In music that means that you have perfect tone hearing. You can pull notes out of thin air not relative to other notes. ...It's a thing that less than 2 percent of all musicians in the world have," he said. 

A three-song demo recording came next and then the Lawroski family accompanied Wayne on a Norwegian Epic cruise of the Caribbean. Little Jimmy joined Wayne on stage each night for a song, and the duo wrote more original material.  

Lawroski said his son picked up the guitar when he was 3 years old and could play simple chords at 4. At 10, he played at a Stone Pony event featuring local talent.

"They loved him and he brought a lot of people, so they loved him even more," said Lawroski.  

He's played solo acoustic sets there a few times since and has sat in with other bands, but Friday night was his first gig with his own full band.

Lawroski and his wife are devoting a tremendous amount of time to helping Jimmy develop his talent and their son's career, but he also loves to play baseball and made the honor roll at school while he was working on the CD project, said Lawroski. 

"I hate to brag about my kid, but he's like the dream kid. He doesn't give me any problems at all really," the proud father said before conceding with a laugh that he has to "get on him a little bit" about homework.

The Lawroskis also had a daughter named Cassie who died when she was 6 months old in 1997.  Wayne and Little Jimmy wrote a song about her called "Faster than Angels Fly," which the band played Friday night.

I asked Lawroski if he has any concerns about his son's budding career.

"When you're in the music business, there's always the element of drugs and alcohol. That's a concern," he said. 

But he doesn't drink or do drugs and he and doesn't allow substance abusers around Jimmy. 

"We try to keep him around people that are solid and instill good morals and values in him, and teach him about drugs," Lawroski said.  

Little Jimmy appeared to be having a great time Friday night. When his set was done, he signed some CDs and then ran around with his friends. My sister-in-law, Sudie Brattli, introduced me to him as a journalist who wanted an interview. I told him to go have fun and said I'd call him another time.

Lawroski hesitated for a moment when I asked him if I could speak to his son on Monday, and then stayed close as I asked a few questions.

Little Jimmy told me that his favorite part of playing the guitar is the feeling it gives him and the sound of the "cool licks" he plays. 

I asked if he gets nervous up on stage or feels at home there.

"I feel nervous and I feel at home," he said. 

I asked if kids at school treat him like a rock star. 

"Kind of. Some kids show me jealousy though," he said. "It's annoying."

"How do you deal with that?" I asked.

"I just ignore them," he said. 

The band sounded really good Friday night, but then I'm used to my in-laws' bands sounding really good and I'm pretty tone deaf so I have no idea how talented Little Jimmy Lawroski is. 

I do know this though: families bond in different ways. The Scheller family bonds through music. When we get together, someone's going to pull out a guitar, someone else is going to start singing, and those of us who can't do either will serve the food and soak up the sound. So I'm not too worried about Little Jimmy. He seems to have a level head on his shoulders and there are a lot worse things he could be doing with his time than hanging out with his parents making music. 

Little Jimmy will perform next at the 14th annual Brookdale Guitar Show in Lincroft on April 10 and at The Shore House in Point Pleasant on April 16.

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