Jay Whitney Performs Solo

Guitarist Jay Whitney performed a rare solo show at Stone’s Throw Winery the afternoon of Aug. 23, playing acoustic guitar and singing.

In fact, the talented guitarist for Big Mouth and the Power Tool Horns will tell you, “Stone’s Throw is the only place I’ve played as a solo. It’s seems to work. I guess I’m fooling them.”

The solo gig came about through Ginny Sowinski, special events coordinator at Stone’s Throw and wife of Big Mouth bass player Paul Sowinski.

“Ginny knows I do duets, so she asked if I would do a solo,” Whitney said. “I thought, well, I’ll give it a shot. As a solo it’s kind of a hard one to do. It’s a four-hour gig. There’s no soloing to do. The songs are shorter. She said, ‘That’s OK. You can just noodle around for a while.’” He laughs at that and adds, “Well, we’ll see about that. But she’s the one who got me started doing it.”

While Big Mouth will remain his main musical outlet, Whitney said he is taken with the idea of doing more solo gigs, to the point where he is going to invest in a looper.

“The looper records up to 5 or 10 minutes, so I can actually play a 12-bar or 16-bar progression, play the chords in it, record it and play on top of that, so it sounds a little fuller,” he said. “I think that’s one of the drawbacks to doing a solo gig, that there’s just you. There’s nothing else. No rhythm. I’d like to be able to solo a little bit as well over the top of something. I’m eager to try it out.”

He and Paul Sowinski have also talked about doing more house concerts as a duet.

“Someone hosts a show in their house. You sit in their living room or whatever and play. We did one last week in Wabeno and it was a blast,” Whitney said.

Anyone interested in a Jay Whitney solo performance or a house concert can call him at 920. 559.0050.

You can catch Whitney’s muscular guitar lines with the full band on Sunday, Aug. 31, when Big Mouth & The Power Tool Horns are part of the 3rd annual End of Summer Party at the Gibraltar Grill. The party begins at 2 pm with folk from Cookee, followed by the One Too Many Band at 2:30 pm. Big Mouth plays 6:30 to 10 pm.