GOOD FRIEND GEORGE WINSTON PERFORMS HERE

Everyone should have a friend like George Winston. He'd come over on Saturday mornings and practice on your piano while you put jam on toast and maybe lit a fire. He probably wouldn't say much, just expect you to turn off the phone for a couple hours while he works on a few things. You'd drift in and out of his exquisite melodies, passages that evoke wintry wind in pines and wild streams and other kinds of passages.

See you next time, George.

Winston played his friendly music for about 400 people Sunday afternoon at Academic Auditorium in a concert sponsored by the Student Activities Council.

His fans recognize his music -- especially gorgeous original songs like "Thanksgiving" and "Colors," and the 19th-century Ukrainian tune "Carol of the Bells" -- much better than the musician.

"You didn't know it was me," he kidded after he walked onstage with a guitar case and the audience was slow to applaud.

Winston played two Hawaiian slack key guitar tunes Sunday and demonstrated the beauty of this solo finger-picking style. In the chiming "Flight of the Bird," his fingers lightly flew through a tune largely based on harmonics.

Later on, he also played two harmonicas in a lively improvisation based on an Eastern European traditional.

But piano, performed in a variety of styles, is Winston's forte. He began with the impressionistic interplays that first brought him attention -- "Colors," which he said was influenced both by composer Steve Reich and by Winston's boyhood Montana home, moved pleasingly from melancholy to robustness -- and in "Dog and Cat" advanced to the stride piano style Fats Waller helped make famous. He juggled the rhythmic demands of the technique nicely.

There also was a stop in New Orleans for a slow-cooked rhythm and blues rendition of "When the Saints Come Marching In," and he played the late Vince Guaraldi's famous "Peanuts" tunes, "Linus and Lucy" and "The Great Pumpkin Waltz."

Winston is not a perfect musician. He's a bit stiff -- Do you call that a bow? -- and makes mistakes. But what is not showmanship and flawlessness is genuineness and a self-taught artisan's appreciation for making a song sound good. Or sometimes, as when he manually muted the strings at the end of "Moon," just interesting.

Winston received two standing ovations from the audience, which was composed of a mix of ages. Saying goodbye, he asked them to leave unwanted programs to be recycled.

See you next time, George.