Jimmie Vaughan knows heartbreak and heartache. But his magical medicine has always been his guitar.
“I’ve been doing it since I was 12 years old,” Jimmie said. “I love to play the guitar.”
He loved playing the guitar with his younger brother Stevie Ray.
“We had the same room,” Jimmie said about growing up with Stevie in Oak Cliff, Texas. “Same record player. One guitar.”
Jimmie was four years older.
“He watched me learn how to play,” Jimmie said. “I’d set it down then he would pick it up.”
And Jimmie always plays from the heart
“You can express yourself in real-time,” he said.
After tragically losing his brother in a helicopter crash there were days he played with a broken heart. But, in December of 2022, his heart almost stopped.
“I knew the symptoms,” he said. “Whenever I get a heart attack, I get the pain down the back of my arm. Or one side or the other.”
This was Jimmie’s third heart attack, and it was different. The pain wasn’t in just one arm.
“This time I had both and I had what felt like indigestion,” Jimmie said.
His wife rushed him to the hospital.
“He had a heart attack when he came in,” Cardiac Surgeon Dr. Mark Felger with Cardiothoracic and Vascular Surgeons said. And Jimmie will never forget what the surgeon told him next: 'We’re going to put you in and do a quadruple bypass.'
“He had significant blockages and that was when the decision was made that he needed bypass surgery,” Dr. Felger said.
Jimmie said he felt terrified as they prepped him for surgery, but he said he felt like he was in good hands.
The surgery entailed opening his chest, putting him on the heart-lung machine, and stopping his heart as Dr. Felger cleared out four blocked arteries. Now, Jimmie is better than ever.
“Absolutely, that’s the whole reason for doing this to get people back to the lifestyle they want to lead without fear of having another heart attack,” Dr. Felger said.
Jimmie didn’t miss a beat with his practice schedule as he gears up for a new tour.
“I’ve been playing guitar at my house every day,” Jimmie said.
And he’s thankful for his new life and his doctors.
“Do what they say,” Jimmie said. “I mean. Here I am. I’m great. I’ll be good for 10, 15 years.”
He says he knows he’s had a blessed life with a beautiful family that his brother never had the chance to experience and there are still some tough days.
“Some days it comes back, and you feel it all over,” Jimmie said.
So, Jimmie goes back to his music.
“It’s like going to church,” he said.
He also has a new fan who might get a few passes to Jimmie’s next show.
“We talked about that a little bit,” Dr. Felger said as he laughed at the thought of it. “He said he was going back on tour here pretty soon and I told him I had an aversion to being in crowds, but he said he could sneak me into the VIP area if he had to.”
Jimmie said he’s got it all worked out.
“We’ve got him a private booth,” he said. “A private booth with our friends. He won’t be harmed by the patrons.”
A front-row seat to watch a new lease on life.