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A tribute to Jim (James) Wayner

1947 - 2007

A Note from the Webmaster:

My name is Sam Johnston, I am one of a very few fortunate people who knew Jim Wayner.

Jim was in most part a mentor, not just to me, but to several Musicians, and they know who they are. Jim knew how to drive you to achieve your best.

He also worked on the idea of throwing you in and letting you swim, in my case anyway, I never thought that I would learn how to operate Sound and work with Donny Walsh or Paul James, etc. Thanks for that opportunity Jim.

I spent my working time with Jim and even more time with him and Orial. I knew Jim since 86 when he walked over to my table at Gramma Lees and asked if I would be the tech for the new Sounder.

We continued working together right up to his end. There are just far too many great stories to be told on this page. To paint a complete picture of Jim and his personality you would need hundreds of pages.

I think one story that sticks out in my mind, as it truly showed Jim's hilarious twisted sense of humour was at my wedding. I asked Jim if he would do grace and he replied, "Sure, where is she?" several people who had just sipped on their wine did spit takes, the rest just roared in laughter.

He was a stageman first and always, ever looking to entertain, and even more so when it came to kids. Jim loved kids, His own childhood was very rough and when ever he could make a small boy or girl smile, you could see tears in his eyes.

I hope you will look through this site, most of what is here has been edited from Jim's own pages (he wrote MrBlues.com himself). I have taken his pages plus a dedication DVD and put them together here so that you can get to know Jimmy a little better.

Sam Johnston 2011

Memories of Jim by Dave Fearnall

My memories of Jim span some 40 odd years, from the early 60's traveling to and from various places in Ontario in the back of a hearse to recently this year when we lost him to complications resulting from a strangulated bowel.

As you can well imagine, there are far too many memories that accumulate in that period of time to be presented here, but i will touch on a few beginning with my first introduction to the man.

In the early 60's, our recently formed band, The Tombstones, auditioned Dennis Scott as a potential drummer for the group. He brought his friend Jim (who also had aspirations of becoming a drummer) along with him for moral support and as we ran through a few tunes with Dennis, we could hear Jim singing along without benefit of a microphone. Even so, his powerful voice could be heard clearly above the band and it wasn't long before we had a new drummer and two singers fronting the group. Up to that point, our repertoire had consisted of mostly "British Invasion" music but Jim now gave us the potential to add R&B tunes to the agenda.

We traveled to may places in Ontario, including Bracebridge where we found monks from an Anglican monastery running the local teen dances in a place called "The Place". It was at one of these dances where Jim jumped off of a four foot high stage landing in the splits, not realizing that he had ripped the crotch out of his pants. Being one who preferred to dress without benefit of underwear, one can easily understand the embarrassment that ensued. As it turned out, the band returned frequently to Bracebridge, playing the dance Saturday night, sleeping at the monastery, and doing a folk mass on Sunday in their chapel.

We miss you greatly old friend.

If you have any stories or attachments to add, please click here

Jim's Bands

The Tombstones

The Tires

Early Sounder

The Sharks

The James Wayner Revue

Second Sounder

Georgia Straight

The BearCats

Sounder