WE MAY HAVE A SMALL HANDFUL OF TICKETS GET RELEASED ON THURSDAY EVENING - Please email us at [email protected] if you're interested. Please let us know how many tickets you want to purchase.
For the first time in nearly a decade, George Winston returns to the Greenwich Odeum! Inspired by the seasons and topographies, George Winston's concerts feature a variety of styles, including melodic folk piano, New Orleans R&B piano, and stride piano. He performs songs from his seasonal favorites AUTUMN, DECEMBER, WINTER INTO SPRING and SUMMER, as well as Peanuts pieces from his Vince Guaraldi tribute albums LINUS & LUCY - THE MUSIC OF VINCE GUARALDI and LOVE WILL COME - THE MUSIC OF VINCE GUARALDI, VOL. 2 and more.
IMPORTANT NOTE: There will be a canned food drive at this performance. Please join us in support of a local food bank by bringing a donation of canned food to the concert. There will be collection baskets at the entrances.
"Perhaps best known for the ringing, rural folk-piano sound of his earliest recordings ("December", "Autumn"), pianist George Winston has spent the last decade and a half deeply schooling himself in the music of artists who inspire him, including Vince Guaraldi, the Doors and the great rhythm-and-blues players of New Orleans." - SEATTLE TIMES
"Pianist George Winston's music cuts a broad swath in both style and substance … His concerts are always a blend of performance and philanthropy, with a canned food drive held at every show to benefit a local food bank, and portions of his merchandise sales donated to those organizations as well." - THE INTELLIGENCER
DOORS - 7:30pm
PERFORMANCE 8pm
ARTIST BIO
George Winston grew up mainly in Montana, and also spent his later formative years in Mississippi and Florida. During this time, his favorite music was instrumental rock and instrumental R&B, including Floyd Cramer, the Ventures, Booker T & The MG’s, Jimmy Smith, and many more. Inspired by R&B, jazz, Blues and rock (especially the Doors), George began playing organ in 1967. In 1971 he switched to the acoustic piano after hearing recordings from the 1920s and the 1930s by the legendary stride pianists Thomas “Fats” Waller and the late Teddy Wilson. In addition to working on stride piano, he also at this time came up with this own style of melodic instrumental music on solo piano, called folk piano. In 1972, he recorded his first solo piano album, BALLADS AND BLUES 1972, for the late guitarist John Fahey’s Takoma label.
His latest solo piano release is LOVE WILL COME – THE MUSIC OF VINCE GUARALDI, VOL. 2 (released 2/2/10), which features compositions by the late jazz pianist, including pieces from the Peanuts® TV specials. His next album SPRING CAROUSEL-A CANCER RESEARCH BENEFIT will be released in 2015.
Since 1980 George has released ten other solo piano albums: AUTUMN (1980), WINTER INTO SPRING (1982), DECEMBER (1982), SUMMER (1991), FOREST (1994), LINUS & LUCY-THE MUSIC OF VINCE GUARALDI (1996), which features compositions by the late jazz pianist, including Cast Your Fate to the Wind and pieces from the Peanuts® TV specials; PLAINS (1999), which was inspired by his Eastern Montana upbringing, NIGHT DIVIDES THE DAY - THE MUSIC OF THE DOORS (2002), and MONTANA - A LOVE STORY (2004) and GULF COAST BLUES & IMPRESSIONS – A HURRICANE RELIEF BENEFIT (2006).
Also, in 2001 George released REMEMBRANCE - A MEMORIAL BENEFIT, a six song CD of piano, guitar and harmonica solos, to benefit those affected by 9/11. He has also worked with the late George Levenson of Informed Democracy (www.informeddemocracy.com) on three projects: a solo guitar soundtrack for SADAKO AND THE THOUSAND PAPER CRANES, and soundtracks of piano, guitar and, harmonica solos for PUMPKIN CIRCLE, and BREAD COMES TO LIFE. In 1984 he also did the solo piano soundtrack for the children’s story THE VELVETEEN RABBIT for Rabbit Ears Productions.
George is presently concentrating mainly on live performances, and most of the time he is touring playing solo piano concerts (the Summer Show or the Winter Show), solo guitar concerts, solo harmonica concerts, and solo piano dances (with R&B and slow dance songs).
He is also studying the playing of the great New Orleans pianists Henry Butler, James Booker, Professor Longhair, Dr. John, and Jon Cleary, and he is also working on interpreting pieces on solo piano by his favorite composers, including Vince Guaraldi, Professor Longhair, the Doors, Frank Zappa, Randy Newman, Sam Cooke, Curtis Mayfield, Laura Nyro, Al Kooper, Dr. John, Henry Butler, James Booker, Jon Cleary, Ralph Towner, Arthur Lee, Milt Jackson, John Hartford, Oliver Schroer, Taj Mahal, Philip Aaberg, and others, to play at concerts, and at his solo piano dances.
George is also working on solo guitar and is recording the masters of the Hawaiian Slack Key guitar for an extensive series of albums for Dancing Cat Records (www.dancingcat.com). Slack Key is the name for the beautiful solo fingerstyle guitar tradition, unique to Hawaii, which began in the early 1800s and predated the steel guitar by over half a century. He is also recording his main inspirations for his harmonica playing, Sam Hinton, Rick Epping, and Curt Bouterse.
George Winston plays Steinway Pianos
PHOTO CREDIT - Joe Del Tufo
