Phyllis Wozniak was born on 1 February 1930 in
Michigan City, Indiana, USA. Winters cites her first main singing influence as
Sarah Vaughan. After a brief spell as an office worker, she moved with a girlfriend and with
Dick Groves to
Denver, Colorado, where she sang and played the piano in clubs and took on the stage name of Pinky Winters. In 1953, Winters and Groves moved to
California, performing in venues such as the Starlight night club in
Los Angeles. At a gig one night in
Santa Monica,
Anita O’Day, who had a regular singing spot and who was going to be out of town for two weeks, gave her spot to Winters who found herself performing with players such as pianist
Hampton Hawes and bass player
Red Mitchell. She returned to performing, recording and touring after her second divorce. In 1982 she began a partnership with
Lou Levy, an accompanist who had worked with
Peggy Lee and
Ella Fitzgerald. From an on-and-off four decade career, Winters became known for her intimate and informal singing style, with what the jazz expert Doug Ramsey describes as "impeccable diction, interpretation, time and phrasing". The inventive singing on her albums is now highly prized. She toured in the
Netherlands (1994), in
Indonesia and in 2016 in
Japan, with veteran pianist Kiyoshi Morita. Four or five of her records were released in Japan. Winters is still in demand as a performer. During the
pandemic lockdowns however, she
self-isolated and did not sing publicly. In an interview in September 2021, on the "West Coast Jazz Hour # 41 with Pinky Winters", then over 90 years old, Winters stated that she felt she had one more album in her. == Personal life ==