Meet Janine Girardi, Eddie Rabbitt’s wife

Janine Girardi is the wife of Eddie Rabbitt. Rabbitt, Janine’s husband, was an American country music singer and songwriter. His career began as a songwriter in the late 1960s, with hits such as “Kentucky Rain” for Elvis Presley in 1970 and “Pure Love” for Ronnie Milsap in 1974 launching him into a recording career.

Later in the 1970s, with hits like “Suspicions,” “I Love a Rainy Night” (a number-one hit single on the Billboard Hot 100), and “Every Which Way but Loose” (the theme from the film of the same name), Rabbitt helped to develop the crossover-influenced sound of country music that became popular in the 1980s. His duets with Juice Newton, “Both to Each Other (Friends and Lovers),” and “You and I,” with Crystal Gayle, later appeared on the soap operas Days of Our Lives and All My Children.

Janine Girardi and Rabbitt met through mutual friends. Much has remained unknown about how the two adored birds met. Rabbitt was said to be madly in love with Girardi, his wife. Her husband described her as “a little thing about five feet tall, with long, black beautiful hair and a really pretty face.” He had previously written two songs for her, “Pure Love” and “Sweet Janine.”

Rabbitt married Janine Girardi in a beautiful ceremony in front of their friends, family, and loved ones in 1976. Their lovely marriage produced three children. Demelza, Timmy, and Tommy are their three children.

Timmy Girardi, Janine Girardi’s son, was born with biliary atresia. For survival, he needed a liver transplant, which he received in 1985, but the procedure failed and he died.

“But I needed to be with Janine at the time,” her husband explains. “She, like me, needed a lot of help.” Rabbitt, her husband, temporarily paused his career, saying, “I didn’t want to be out of the music business, but where I was more important.” Tommy was born in the year 1986.

Rabbitt Girardi, Janine Girardi’s husband, died of lung cancer on May 7, 1998, at the age of 56 in Nashville. He was diagnosed with the disease in March 1997 and underwent radiation treatment as well as surgery to remove a portion of one lung. On May 8, 1998, his body was interred at Nashville’s Calvary Cemetery.