John Dawson Winter III (February 23, 1944 – July 16, 2014) was an American singer, guitarist, songwriter, and record producer.

[2] Winter was known for his high-energy blues rock albums, live performances, and slide guitar playing from the late 1960s into the early 2000s.

In 1988, he was inducted into the Blues Foundation Hall of Fame and in 2003, he was ranked 63rd in Rolling Stone magazine's list of the "100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time".

Their father, Leland, Mississippi native John Dawson Winter Jr. (1909–2001), was also a musician who played saxophone and guitar and sang at churches, weddings, Kiwanis and Rotary Club gatherings.

When Winter was ten years old, the brothers appeared on a local children's show with Johnny playing ukulele.

King's "It's My Own Fault" to loud applause, and within a few days, was signed to what was reportedly the largest advance in the history of the recording industry at that time—$600,000.

[5] It featured the same backing musicians with whom he had recorded The Progressive Blues Experiment, bassist Tommy Shannon and drummer Uncle John Turner, plus Edgar Winter on keyboards and saxophone on 2 tracks, and (for his "Mean Mistreater") Willie Dixon on upright bass and Big Walter Horton on harmonica.

It introduced more staples of Winter's concerts, including Chuck Berry's "Johnny B. Goode" and Bob Dylan's "Highway 61 Revisited".

"[8] Beginning in 1969, the first of numerous Johnny Winter albums was released which were cobbled together from approximately fifteen singles (about 30 "sides") he recorded before signing with Columbia in 1969.

As Winter stated in an interview when the subject of Roy Ames came up, "This guy has screwed so many people it makes me mad to even talk about him."

[4] The album included Derringer's "Rock and Roll, Hoochie Koo" and signaled a more rock-oriented direction for Winter.

[4] By 1973, he returned to the music scene with the release of Still Alive and Well, a basic blend of blues and hard rock, whose title track was written by Rick Derringer.

His comeback concert at Long Island, New York's Nassau Coliseum featured the "And" line-up minus Rick Derringer and Bobby Caldwell.

[10] In 1975, Johnny returned to Bogalusa, Louisiana, to produce an album for Thunderhead, a Southern rock band which included Pat Rush and Bobby "T" Torello, who would later play with Winter.

[12] In live performances, Winter often told the story about how, as a child, he dreamed of playing with the blues guitarist Muddy Waters.

[13] In addition to producing the album, Winter played guitar with Waters veteran James Cotton on harmonica.

AllMusic writer Mark Deming noted: "Between Hard Again and The Last Waltz [1976 concert film by The Band], Waters enjoyed a major career boost, and he found himself touring again for large and enthusiastic crowds".

The brothers claimed the comics falsely portrayed them as "vile, depraved, stupid, cowardly, subhuman individuals who engage in wanton acts of violence, murder and bestiality for pleasure and who should be killed.

[24] According to his guitarist friend and record producer Paul Nelson, Winter died of emphysema combined with pneumonia.

[25] Writing in Rolling Stone magazine, after Winter's death, David Marchese said, "Winter was one of the first blues rock guitar virtuosos, releasing a string of popular and fiery albums in the late Sixties and early Seventies, becoming an arena-level concert draw in the process" ... [he] "made an iconic life for himself by playing the blues".

[32] Multiple guitarists have cited Winter as an influence, including Joe Perry,[33][34] Frank Marino,[35] Michael Schenker,[36] Adrian Smith,[37] Alex Skolnick[38] and Billy Corgan,[39] whose band The Smashing Pumpkins released a song titled "Tribute to Johnny".

[40] In 2008 Johnny Winter appeared (alongside brother Edgar) in the documentary film American Music: Off the Record directed by Benjamin Meade.

[45]In 2008, the Gibson Custom Shop issued a signature Johnny Winter Firebird V[4] in a ceremony in Nashville with Slash presenting.

With its unusual design (for the time) without a headstock and having a small body, Winter responded immediately: "the first day I plugged it in, it sounded so good that I wanted to use it for a gig that night.

[4][46] Winter preferred a plastic thumb pick sold by Gibson[42] and a steel pinky slide, later marketed by Dunlop.