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This interview first appeared in New Age Voice, Feb., 2000
George
Winston
Unleashed
by Carol Wright
George
Winston
Unleashed
by Carol Wright
In the early 1980s, George Winston defined a whole new style of piano playing: solo, clean and simple, yet with a sophisticated complexity. Last fall, Windham Hill released Plains, an atmospheric book end to his earlier Forest, both in tribute to his home state of Montana.
Winston splits his musical talents between piano (stride, folk, and rhythm and blues), the Hawaiian slack key guitar (for which he formed Dancing Cat Records), and the harmonica.
I thought I was prepared for this inteview by reasearching Winston on the internet, reading his presskit, seeing his entertaining Seasons in Concert video, and listening to all my CDs. (I was wrong.) After several postponements, Winston finally called me from his cellphone. We talked as he inched through LA traffic (frequently interrupted by static and disconnections – he always called back) on the way to his gig in San Diego the next day. I talked to him from my apartment on Orcas Island.
Carol Wright: What was the musical climate when your Autumn and December albums made such an impact in the early 1980s?
George: I have no idea. Who knows?Carol: There goes half my interview, and I didn't even ask a yes/no question!
George: Well, when Autumn came out, I hadn't dealt with the pop scene since 1967. Pop-wise, 1967 was such a degrading year, I slipped away as a listener. With Autumn and December, I just played what I wanted without referring to the pop scene. Who knows why they made such an impact? Nothing's changed: I always play what I want, and not because the tunes relate to the pop scene.Carol: Before you recorded with Windham Hill, you contacted William Ackerman several times. What affinity did you feel for his type of music that made you want to be on his label?
George: Our conversations weren't regarding my own music. I was trying to get Ackerman to record some guitarists – Hawaiian slack key guitarists. I didn't approach him with an appeal to "please record me." Music-wise, I don't want anyone to do anything with me unless they really want to. What's the point of that?Carol: Let me ask this another way: When Autumn first came out (this may sound simplistic) I thought, "This is real music, without any of the commercial trappings of . . . any . . . thing."
George: That's what I call "folk piano." I also play rhythm and blues and stride piano. The folk piano style is one I made up to play things with the piano resonance, to let the piano ring out. And the melodic folk style also complements the faster pieces. With me, it's always rhythm and blues first, melodic second. And each song has to have a relationship with every other song. It's like a bird . . .Carol: It is? Like a what?
George: A bird. Or like a cat. Each song is an individual and has relationship. One song will want to be stride, another wants to be rhythm and blues, while another will be folk. But the R&B is what I'm working on now. My next album will be called Dance.Carol: Going to work with a combo on that?
George: Nah. I like to BE the band. If I had a bass player, what should I do with my left hand? Tie it behind my back? What should I do with the upper part of my left hand that's taken by the guitar? I don't really listen well to other people playing while I'm playing. It's just how I am, and I try to make the best of it and turn it to my advantage. If you're four-foot-ten, be a jockey, not a basketball player. Make who you are work for you: that's one of the Number One lessons that I've learned.
I always work solo, I don't even think of music any other way. I occasionally accompany somebody if I have a long relationship with their music, but then they tell me what to do. Or they'll tell me to do it my way, but I say "okay, but you have to tell me if you like it or not, because it's your record." Either I'm the boss or they are – can't have two of us.Carol: I liked your concert video, Concert in Seasons.
George: I'm glad you liked it, but video really isn't my medium. But I loved being able to talk about Keola Beemer, Chet Atkins, Vince Guaraldi – some of my heroes.Carol: I was impressed with your graciousness acknowledging your influences and playing as a collaborator.
George: When I taped the slack key segment with Keola, I told him, "You're theboss – do whatever you want to." Then he'd say, "Well, you can do whatever you want to." And then I'd say, "Yeah, as long as you tell me if you don't like it, like if I get too crazy with the high notes or something."
Carol: After you! No, after you! See? That's gracious.
George: I know his music, and I just try to be him, be the second Keola. Keola's is the first slack key guitar I've ever studied – since 1974. I don't have a Y2K millennium bug because my calendar runs BK: Before Keola. He's my teacher, not any religious figure. I'm not in to that End-of-Time stuff, not into myths and legends. I'm into a "right-now" teacher I can really touch. Thanks anyway, guys, but I'll make up my own calendar.Carol: Let's talk about Plains. There's a real strength and nobility about the region.
George: With Plains and my melodic music, the element of seasons is the deepest thing that I come from. Secondarily ...Carol: Wait, the static is breaking us up . . .
George: How can I be breaking up? I'm single!Carol: Hey, but at least you're in ec"stacy!" (Static stops) Good, that sounds better.
George: Okay. The foundation of my music is seasons. Then location, because the season has to take place somewhere. Then after that will I play "solo instrumental music"; that's how I express my love for the seasons and the earth. The next room is the choice of solo piano, solo guitar, or solo harmonica. And after that are the melodies. And they all work together, and if one element isn't there, then I don't have anything.Carol: Do you like having an emotional or visual reference?
George: Yeah, we all have individual preferences to different music. If you like rock, rap, or Bach . . . (Try saying that fast ten times!)Carol: Rock, rab, or Brach...Urk! Didn't make it.
George: . . . then you are right. People argue about this stuff all the time. If a critic doesn't like me, then they shouldn't like me. What should they do, pretend to like me under some kind of fear? We're not living in a dictatorship here.
Those islands where you live are great, by the way. I hope play there some day.Carol: Love to have you, but we don't have big houses here.
George: The way I look at it, the less people the better. Better acoustics, more intimacy. The best is playing for one person, to get somebody on the bench with you.Carol: I think I could round up a volunteer. Singer Susan Osborn opened a performance space here called The Living Room. Tingstad and Rumbel, Ralf Illenberger, a wonderful guitarist...
George: Don't know his work.. Can't keep up with everyone. Gotta get these slack key records done. As I said, I pretty much have not dealt with pop culture since 1967, even less after 1973. Virtually nothing, except what people turn me on to that might make a good solo piano piece.Carol: Try the original cast recording of Bernstein's On the Town. Incredible tunes, swing, unique harmonies. Fun to figure out.
George: I'll check it out. For every 100 tunes I try, one works. I tried Porgy and Bess awhile ago. Nothing quite worked, except "Summertime."Carol: Have you heard the Porgy and Bess by Ray Charles and Cleo Laine? Beautiful arrangements!
George: I've never heard it, but I saw a billboard for it in 1976. I'll write it down. I have everything Ray Charles has done except that. I rarely turn on the radio, but I accidentally turned it on the other day, and I heard the most beautiful piece I'd heard since 1985 when I heard Henry Butler, the great New Orleans pianist. I think it's called Prayer Circle.Carol: The Prayer Cycle by Jonathan Elias.
George: God! I can't believe those chords! And was I hearing James Taylor singing with an orchestra? Song after song came on with these incredible progressions. And just as I wondered if I could learn some of those voicings, the announcer said it was James Taylor!
I have not been affected by a song as much . . . James Taylor is the most understated Mr. Soul of all times. I remember being very affected by his two albums in 1968. He was an impetus for me to play melodic music, and not just rhythm and blues.
But really, I don't hear too much recent music because I have to get all these slack key albums done. I'm working with fourteen players now.Carol: Do you spend a lot of time in Hawaii?
George: Perhaps once a year. My interest in slack key is to make an encyclopedia of this music so people can hear what was happening the last half of the twentieth century. At the very least, I want people to know that slack key is NOT the Hawaiian steel string guitar. Slack key fingerstyle started around 1830.Carol: Do you ever search for yourself on the internet?
George: No, I already got me. Why would I do that? I think my interest in surfing the net ranks right below my interest in religion.Carol: There are websites and chat message boards devoted to you. And do they want sheet music!
George: There is no sheet music. I don't use sheet music. That's not the spirit in which the music was created. And even if there were, it's so far down the list, I would never get to it. Post that I said they should play their music their way, or play standards. I'm playing my music hundreds of times a year, so it's taken care of.Carol: You have a large number of influences listed on your website.
George: It's as concise as I could make it.Carol: Do I hear some Minimalist affinity on Plains?
George: I love Steve Reich, even though I think Minimalist is a bad title. I consider Reich a "maximalist"! Listen to Music for 18 Musicians; there's twenty things going onin that piece.
Carol: You don't list classical composers.
George: I'd list some classical inspiration, but no "influences." Maybe a hair of Debussy, but I come strictly from the North American culture. The only European music I play is Irish dance music on the solo harmonica. I really come from the decade 1957 to '67. I can't pretend to be anything else; I play Sam Cook, Fats Waller, and Buddy Holly. I'll leave that classical stuff to the experts.
But that's not to say I don't like it. Sometimes who one is as a listener is different than who one is as a player. Listening is actually for fun, but then I don't do recreational listening any more. I don't play recreationally, either. I practice so when there's a person around to listen, I can do good. That's who I am with that stuff.Carol: Do you get into a meditative state while you play?
George: Never. I get into a practice zone, and if I get something good, I "can it" and find someone to play it for. "Come here, I have something good for you to hear!" Who did you say this article is for again?Carol: New Age Voice.
George: You can say, strange we're interviewing him since he doesn't play that kind of music. But we're interviewing him anyway.Carol: Strange, especially since your music, specifically, is the core of the genre of the New Age category. [Note: Plains was nominated for a 1999 Grammy Award in the New Age category.]
George: People might call my music New Age, but I call it folk piano. It's not meditation music. I have a harder edge. I have a melody, I have a rhythm, I don't have a synthesizer. I know what I play; I mean, I'm the expert. Some people tell me I'm not classifiable. I'm totally classifiable. It's piano, totally folky, and simple. So, I want you write that I don't have anything to do with N.A..Carol: For another magazine, I wrote a yearly article titled "Just Don't Call Me New Age Music."
George: Someone in Japan wanted to do an interview with musicians who don't call themselves that. And I said, "Look, if you call me an elephant, and I say I'm not an elephant, are you going to write an article about me not being an elephant?" I have time only for something real here! I'm not an elephant, I'm not a crow, I'm not a pine tree. Think about how much meaningless stuff we all aren't.Carol: George...You know what?
George: What?Carol: You're Very Funny.
George: Well, you're very cool!
Here's my final line on that N.A. stuff. That's meditation music -- I don't do it. If someone wants to use my music for meditation, or for procreation, that's their business. I shouldn't be consciously trying to affect a person that way, anyway.Carol: What about trance music?
George: That's a negative thing, that mind control stuff. Trances are drugs, and I'm opposed to both. A person should always be conscious and be able to stop doing whatever they want. The mind should always have total control. We definitely make our own way.
There is the soul, and I try to get in touch with that. But I'm dealing with my own experience here. I'm not dealing with what somebody told me to approved or be good or be nice, and I don't deal with any guide. What if you have a guide and it turns out that they are lying? I know that I'm not lying to myself.
If I were going to look inside myself – which I do – I need silence. I don't need a record on. Using the computer has taught me about cleaning up my brain. Go in and get it organized: delete, delete, delete, delete. That's my version of meditation.
As far as the New Age being an "enlightened age": This is not the Enlightened Age. Just read the headlines: the consciousness is the same as it was in the Inquisition.
I really wish I had the ability to make the world better. I'd be the last person to say I can really make a difference in the world. I say I just play folk music: All I have to offer is tunes. It's up to the listener what is done with them. Don't make me part of this mythology.
