10/13/2023 0 Comments George winston autumn album![]() I flew out to the concert and the promoter (I believe his name was Rick Wolter) was waiting in the wings when I finally came off stage to tell me my dad had died in surgery. He told me there was nothing I could do for him and that he was proud of me. I told him that I’d cancel a concert I was supposed to perform at Notre Dame the next day. I remember showing him the album cover of a new album I was about to release, George Winston’s AUTUMN. I went to visit him in the hospital the day before he was to have a very complicated heart surgery. He had seen me tour in Germany which, being the origin of the English language, meant a lot to him. My father, who happened to be the head of the English Department at Stanford, had by then become reconciled to his son NOT becoming an academic. At some point very early on in my musical career he cut out this article of fresh scrubbed faces in a singing group who were performing in Swanton and sent it on to me. He kept getting the weekly newspaper from his home town. Regarding the clipping: My father grew up in Swanton, Ohio. The final transition happened only a couple of years ago when I went through a legal name change to the nice, simple name of Will Ackerman. When I recorded my first album, The Search for the Turtle’s Navel (remind me to tell you the story of Bill Sterling sometime), I used William Ackerman. Stars George Winston’s 'Autumn' has served as an emotional backdrop to the change of season. When I became a carpenter and printed my first business card, I was Will Ackerman. Autumn by George Winston, released 01 January 1980 1. I already had the William part in my hefty four-name name, so it was Will that finally stuck.įor a while I pretty much had to acknowledge all those early names and there was some advantage in knowing where and when these people knew me. Then I met a guy named Will Sampson who I though was very cool… a bit older, handsome…everything I wasn’t. This was mostly during the time I was in living in La Honda in Ken Kesey’s old hang out. I think Chris had a character in his writing named Benj and he thought I was like him. I think it was Chris Patton who decided I should be Benj and that stuck around for quite some time. The transition included Jeff being spelled as Geoff, but that went by the wayside pretty quickly. I have absolutely no explanation for where that came from, but I remember girlfriends calling me Jeff. Having left prep school in Massachusetts where I was George and landing at Stanford University, I saw an opportunity to shed the whole George business and I somehow arrived at Jeff. ![]() I was never really thrilled with the George part of things, though I was pretty well stuck with it. No one ever explained the Benedict part and it never occurred to me to ask. I was given the rather ponderous name of George (my father’s father’s name) William Benedict Ackerman. My adopted father’s name was Robert William Ackerman and he was known as Bill. I was adopted into the Ackerman family at the advanced age of 5 days.
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