HARTFORD, Connecticut. — Nearly nine years after Johnny Winter’s death, there is a court battle for control of the legendary blues guitarist’s music, with allegations of theft and greed flying back and forth.
The legal battle pits Winter’s former personal manager and bandmate Paul Nelson and the family of the bluesman’s late wife Susan, who died in 2019.
Winter’s relatives say that Nelson and his wife wrongfully took over $1.5 million from Winter’s music business, including the auctioning off of some of the late musician’s guitars.
Nelson and his wife countersued, claiming that Susan Winter’s siblings swooped in while she was recovering and dying of cancer and tricked her into giving them control of Winter’s music, depriving Nelson of his rights as the beneficiary of Susan Winter’s estate.
The case was due to go to a Connecticut court in April, but was pushed back to September.
At stake is ownership of Winter’s music catalog, the proceeds from the sale of records and merchandise, and the right to authorize any commercial use of his songs, for an unknown value.
“The point is to preserve the legacy of Johnny Winter, and to justify and ensure that the Nelsons do not illegally take the money rightfully owed to the plaintiffs,” said Timothy Dimand, attorney for the Susan Winter siblings, Bonnie and Christopher Warford.
Nelson wants to be re-appointed as the beneficiary of Susan Winter’s estate.
“Plaintiffs orchestrated the wrongful termination of Paul Nelson during a difficult time in the last year of Susan Winter’s life,” the Nelsons said in a statement released by their lawyer, Matthew Mason. They said it was clear that both Johnny and Susan Winter wanted Nelson to be in charge of Johnny Winter’s music and legacy.
John Dawson Winter III was born and raised in Beaumont, Texas. He burst onto the global blues scene in the 1960s, dazzling crowds with his fast-paced catchphrases, his trademark long white hair blowing out from under a cowboy hat. He and his brother Edgar – both born with albinism – were both established musicians.
Winter played Woodstock in 1969 and went on to release albums for blues icon Muddy Waters in addition to his own music. In 1988, he was inducted into the Blues Foundation Hall of Fame.
Rolling Stone magazine named him number one in the world. 63rd Greatest Guitarist of All Time in 2015. He has released over two dozen albums and has been nominated for several Grammy Awards, winning his first award posthumously in 2015 for Best Blues Album for “Step Back”. Nelson produced the album and also won a Grammy for it.
Winter, who spent two decades living in Easton, Connecticut, struggled with heroin addiction for years before his death, and credits Nelson, whom he met in 1999, with helping him get off methadone, according to the 2014 documentary Johnny Winter : down”. & filthy.”
Before he got clean, bandmates and friends said they were concerned about his fragile appearance and speech problems. Nelson also credits himself with resurrecting Winter’s musical career.
Winters and the Nelsons became good friends. Paul Nelson played guitar in Johnny Winter’s band and began running his music company in 2005. Nelson’s wife, Marion Nelson, handled the bookkeeping for Winters and the music business, according to legal documents in the lawsuit.
Winter died at the age of 70 on July 16, 2014 in a hotel room near Zurich, Switzerland while on tour. Susan Winter and Paul Nelson said the cause of death was probably emphysema.
Susan Winter was the sole beneficiary of her husband’s estate, which she placed in trust at the end of 2016. She named herself the sole trustee of the trust and Nelson as the successor trustee, meaning that he would inherit the rights to Johnny Winter’s music upon her death.
But in June 2019, four months before her death from lung cancer, Susan Winter removed Nelson as her successor and replaced him with a sister and brother.
In their lawsuit, the Nelsons allege that Bonnie and Christopher Warford gained control by lying to their sister, mistakenly telling her that the Nelsons were mismanaging the music business and her affairs.
The Warford lawsuit accuses the Nelsons of misappropriating more than $1.5 million from Winter’s business “under the guise of royalties, commissions, refunds, fees, social media expenses, and other mechanisms, while confusing and misrepresenting these transactions to Susan. Winter.
They also accused the Nelsons of taking three of Winter’s guitars totaling about $300,000 and selling them at auction without permission. The Nelsons deny the allegations.
“In short, this is a classic case of a manager taking advantage of a client artist and worse, the artist’s surviving family,” Dimand wrote in the lawsuit.
It is not clear why Edgar Winter, a famous musician in his own right, did not handle his brother’s estate after his death. Edgar Winter and his representatives did not return phone calls or emails asking for comment.
The Warfords’ lawsuit is similar to the one Winters filed against Johnny Winter’s former manager Teddy Slatus for alleged financial improprieties around 2005. Slatus died at the end of 2005. It is unclear what happened to the lawsuit.
“Johnny and Susan have been in litigation all their lives and still can’t rest in peace,” said Mary Lou Sullivan, who wrote a biography titled Raisin Cane: The Wild and Raisinal Story of Johnny Winter, published in 2010.
Both the Warfords of Charlotte, North Carolina and the Nelsons of Weston, Conn., declined interview requests provided by the Associated Press.
