Neil Giraldo
Neil Thomas Giraldo was born in Cleveland, Ohio on December 29, 1955. Born of Sicilian parents, he got into music at an early age, and was heavily influenced by Elvis Presley when he was very young. Later, musician Scotty Moore made a big impression on him, as well as the British guitarists Jeff Beck, Jimmy Page and Eric Clapton. Neil began playing the guitar at 6-years-old at his father's urging. "My father always wanted to play guitar and sing, so consequently he encouraged his off-spring. My sister played accordion and so my father said to me, 'You're gonna play guitar,' and that was it!" At age 12 he expanded his musical repertoire by learning to play the piano.
While in New York, Neil met up with Jeff Aldridge from Chrysalis Records and producer Mike Chapman. They, in turn, hooked him up with Pat. Neil was brought in before the making of In The Heat Of The Night as the lead guitarist and musical arranger for the Benatar band. Neil put the band together and has always had a large role in the way their music sounds.
Today, Neil is known not only as an accomplished guitarist and songwriter but as a prolific producer as well. Not many people are aware that Neil actually began producing during their recording of the Crimes of Passion album. "I really started producing during Crimes Of Passion, even though I didn't get credit. On Pat's first record, "In The Heat Of The Night", I was more of an arranger. I would say stuff like, 'I don't like the snare tone' or 'The backbeat feels wrong,' but I wasn't sophisticated enough to know exactly how to fix a problem."
"One day, while I was still composing songs for CoP, Keith Olsen gave me the keys to his Porsche, because he knew I liked to write while driving. I drove around for a while, when I came back, Pat was crying. We were tracking the first song for the record, which was probably "Hell Is For Children," and Keith said, 'I don't know what to do. She can't sing this part.' I went into the control room, set up a better headphone mix, talked her through the song a little bit, and got the vocal happening. That's basically when I took over the production." And he's been doing it ever since.
Today Neil has produced all of Pat's albums as well as a few other artists'. His first outside production credit was on John Waite's debut album Ignition. He has given a helping musical hand to artists such as The Del Lords, Rick Springfield, and Kenny Loggins.
