http://www.chuckleavell.com/2017/06/rip-jimmy-nalls/

RIP Jimmy Nalls

June 23, 2017
JIMMY NALLS – Another Goodbye to Another Good Friend

With sadness and yet with wonderful memories, I regret to report that we have lost another Brother In Arms, my old and good friend, Jimmy Nalls, who passed away yesterday, June 22. Jimmy first came to me back in 1970 when I was playing in Alex Taylor’s band, “Friends and Neighbors”. We were looking for a guitar player to go on the road with us, and Tommy Talton (of Cowboy and later Boyer and Talton) gave a strong recommendation of Jimmy to us. We brought him down to Macon and were immediately impressed and asked him to join us. We embarked on what was to become my first real touring adventure, traveling all over the US and into Canada over the next eighteen months or so. We made our way on this extraordinary excursion in a Ford LTD Station Wagon with six of us cramped inside. There was Alex in the front passenger seat; our tour manager Earl “Speedo” Simms driving (most of the time); and Lou Mullinax (drums), Charlie Hayward (bass), Jimmy and me scattered around the rest of the Wagon. There were times when Bill Stewart was also with us on drums. We had a really good band…and we were all “Young Turks” ready to go anywhere and play any place. We played some great clubs throughout the US…and some not so great ones. We opened up for artists like The Allman Brothers, Mahavishnu Orchestra, Jefferson Starship and others. We traveled together, ate together, rehearsed together, played gigs together. Jimmy and I were roommates in the motels we stayed in. We shared our dreams together, talked of our hopes and aspirations…as well as our disappointments and frustrations. We laughed and cried together, we were brothers. For a time, he and I decided to be vegetarians. In the truck stops, Waffle Houses, Huddle Houses and other places we ate in, we often ordered plain or cheese omelets, one of the few things in those places that fit the bill. So, we were given the moniker “The Omelet Brothers” by the rest of the band.

When Alex decided not to tour anymore, we auditioned for Dr. John, who had just released his famous single “Right Place, Wrong Time” and the full record, called “In The Right Place”…and we got the gig and went on tour with him. So, with mostly the same members, adding in two wonderful female singers: Jessie Smith and Robbie Montgomery…and with Jimmy and I still sharing a motel room on the road, we continued the adventure with Mac (Mac Rebennack, Dr. John’s real name). With Mac, we dressed up in costumes that he wanted us in…strange, colorful clothes that reflected his “Gris Gris” persona at the time. My future wife-to-be, Rose Lane White, and her friend, Sally Pigeri, designed and sewed many of them for us. We opened up for Ike and Tina Turner; and again, sometimes the Allmans and we sometimes headlined shows. We played several festivals, like The Ann Arbor Blues and Jazz Festival in ‘72 and other outdoor gigs. We both learned a great deal from Mac, whom I still consider a mentor…and I’m sure Jimmy felt the same way.

Years later, after I had been in the Allman Brothers Band from late ’72 through ’76, the ABB temporarily broke up. Lamar Williams, Jaimoe and I formed the band Sea Level. We decided we needed a fourth member, and I suggested Jimmy. He came in, and we were re-united and created yet another adventure together. As time went on, the personnel in Sea Level changed, but Jimmy and I always remained, and by the end of the life of the band in 1981, we were the only two original members left.

After that, Jimmy and I found ourselves in separate musical situations. He went on to play a few years with The Nighthawks, a great blues band out of his native Fall Church, Va. area. He played from time to time on solo projects with Noel (Paul) Stookey, of Peter, Paul and Mary fame. He eventually moved to Nashville, where he did some session work and became a respected member of the musical community there. It was during this time that Jimmy developed Parkinson’s Disease…which his mother also had contracted years before. From that time on, for some 22 years, he fought a brave battle… but the malady was not kind to him, and things got worse through the years. He eventually lost the ability to play, and trained himself as an audio engineer for a time. He tried several techniques and remedies to battle the Parkinson’s, but it was sadly a losing battle. Through the years, his friends put together some benefit gigs to help him out…and most recently, there was a wonderful effort that ironically was released just a couple of days before his passing…called “The Jimmy Nalls Project”. Artists like Joe Bonnamasa, Buddy Greene, Dave Duncan, Jimmy Hall, Robben Ford, Gary Nicholson, Warren Haynes, Jack Pearson, Larry Carlton and others lent their talents to the effort, and I am honored to also have my name on it with the track that Robben did: “Natural Thing”. Other friends of Jimmy’s pitched in to organize and finalize it: David Pinkston; Joe Glaser, the famous guitar technician in Nashville; Gabriel Hernandez Joshua Rawlings and others contributed.

This can be found on: www.jimmynallsproject.com , and the proceeds from it will go to Jimmy’s wife, Minnie, and their family.

Jimmy was and will always be a very special friend to me, and I am grateful for the years we had to make music together and to share a portion of our lives together.

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