George Winston

The multi-million selling American pianist George Winston – born in Hart, Michigan on February 11, 1949 - was frequently classified as a new age performer and this was reinforced by his numerous Number 1 albums on the US New Age Chart. George Winston described his music as falling into three more carefully defined musical styles: classic new Orleans R&B piano, rural folk and the Harlem Stride Piano method of playing as popularized by Fats Waller and Teddy Wilson. Whatever label you put on it, Winston's playing was extremely well received by US audiences, and he sold a great many records during a career which lasted a half a century. From a sales point of view, George Winston's golden era was undoubtedly the early 1980s when he had three platinum selling albums – Autumn (1980), Winter into Spring (1982) and December (1982) - all of which went platinum. Although his later record sales never quite matched this height, he consistently topped the New Age Charts with almost every subsequent release and remained one of America's most enduring performers. Other noteworthy albums by George Winston included Summer (1991), Forest (1994), Linus and Lucy: The Music of Vince Guaraldi (1996), Love Will Come: The Music of Vince Guaraldi, Vol. 2 (2010), Restless Wind (2019), and Night (2022). He also released several soundtracks – The Velveteen Rabbit (1994), This Is America, Charlie Brown: The Birth of the Constitution (1988), and Bread Comes to Life with Lily Tomlin (2003) – as well as a harmonica album entitled Harmonica Solos (2012). George Winston died from cancer on June 4, 2023, at the age of 74.