Winfield Parker was born in the small hamlet of Cooksville in Maryland’s Howard County. Despite having five brothers and three sisters, as Winfield tells it he was the only musical member of the family and, even in his case, his musical roots were not as a singer but as a saxophone player. “I started playing that in 1958, when I was about sixteen, he said, so I did not grow up as a singer with a conventional church background or anything like that. I was small too. They used to call me Little Winnie. Inspired on taking up the instrument and as an attendee at Harriet Tubman High School in Clarksville, Maryland, he joined a group called the Veejays. He explained: I was just playing the saxophone with them. I didn¹t name the group. One of my cousins that was playing in the group, he just picked the name off of a record and the label happened to be called Vee-Jay.
As his reputation as a saxophonist grew, around 1960 he was recruited into a second band, Sammy Fitzhugh & the Moroccans, who were based in the Washington DC area. It was with them that he got his first taste of a recording studio, the group cutting Linda Baby c/w Sadie Mae for the New York City-based Poplar label andI Feel Alright c/w Lovers¹ Plea for Atco. As Winfield himself said, I got around, as his next move was to be the saxophonist with none other than Little Richard¹s band. It was great working with Little Richard and it was an experience because I was such a youngster. I was the youngest one in the band.
Back home, he formed a group called the Imperial Thrillers and, for the first time, as well as playing the saxophone, he began singing. Although they won a battle of the bands competition in short order, they did not get to record. We weren¹t together that long, because things started to move pretty fast, he said. That¹s when I ran into Rufus Mitchell, who had Ru-Jac Records operating out of 427 Laurens Street, Baltimore, Maryland. He was booking our group, the Imperial Thrillers – he owned the Ace booking agency and we used to play down Carr¹s Beach all the time. He liked what he heard and he took me on. He particularly singled me out. Nevertheless, it took a degree of persuasion on the part of Rufus Mitchell to convince Winfield he should not only turn his attention to singing but as a solo performer… Yes it did. Recollecting that time, Winfield added: Rufus Mitchell brought in Arthur Conley to open shows for me. I let Arthur wear my suits, because he didn¹t have the clothes to wear to perform. I had real nice suits, still do. Arthur did real well opening my shows, so Mister Mitchell started booking Arthur by himself.
Then Otis [Redding] came to Baltimore with These Arms of Mine and played that song at Carr¹s Beach with my band backing up Otis. After that show was over, we all went over to Bill Dotson¹s nightclub in Glen Burnie, Maryland. Man, we jammed and partied the whole night. Otis went back home and I gave him half my band, because he was getting really recognized for These Arms Of Mine¹ and he needed his own band as soon as possible. Then Mister Mitchell asked Otis to produce me – first me, then Arthur. He set me up to go to Cincinnati to record Sweet Soul Music, when I was really supposed to be in Muscle Shoals, Alabama! I don¹t know why he made that mistake but he did. And Arthur was already in Muscle Shoals with Otis so, okay, well we all know the rest of the story. I felt hurt but there was nothing I could do about it.
I went up there to Philadelphia with Frank Lipsius and Jimmy Bishop, he said. I met them through Mister Mitchell, he introduced us. Although recording in Philadelphia would be consistent over an approximate five-year-period, product would be shopped over a number of different labels: Arctic, Wand, Spring and GSF, with only Spring issuing a second single.
For Arctic, Winfield cut the funky Shake That Thing and the deep Brand New Start, while Wand picked up on the strong, self-penned I¹m Wonderin, a ballad more in a mid-sixties vein than its 1970 release date. The flip, Will There Ever Be Another Love For Me, was written by Barbara Mason, in fact he and Barbara once recorded together but the results remain to be heard. He said, I recorded two great tracks with Barbara, produced by Jimmy Bishop and Jesse James, but these were never released. They are treasures and I wish I could find Jimmy Bishop to see if he still has them. Winfield and Barbara remain in touch.
For his first Spring 45, the Company opted to go with a version of Edwin Starr¹s S.O.S. (Stop Her On Sight). Probably a little too soon after the original – five years – to make the impact it warranted, it did manage to give him his one and only r&b chart hit, climbing to #48 Billboard and #44 Cashbox. It was another Jimmy Bishop production, arranged by Bobby Martin, while the follow-up, Starvin was co-written by Bunny Sigler (with Phil Hurtt). And you know, I just hooked up with Bunny Sigler again, continued Winfield. I¹m going to do some gospel with him, matter of fact. The last of the Philadelphia batch coupled Mac Davis Baby Don¹t Get Hooked On Me and Bobby Womack¹s Trust Me and appeared on GSF. That was Lloyd Price¹s label.
The subjects of label-hopping and comparative lack of success, despite Jimmy Bishop being an influential deejay, were put to Winfield, who replied: I don¹t know why any of that was. I think Jimmy had connections with those different labels and I guess each time he was trying to get the best deal for what it was. Stop Her On Sight probably did best because it was with a bigger label and Spring did not have that many artists, just Joe Simon, Millie Jackson and Act One. So they were able to spend more money on promoting me. But I was never disillusioned, not really. I just kept on going and hoping and praying that something would come up one day.
Although there was a recording hiatus for a while after the GSF release, Winfield continued to keep performing on a regular basis and he recalled some of the acts he had opened for over the years… The Temptations, Four Tops, Shirelles, Moms Mabley, Lou Rawls, William Bell, Carla and Rufus Thomas, Sam & Dave, Brook Benton, Baby Washington, James & Bobby Purify… and that¹s to name just a few. I was a hard act to follow!
Courtesy of Barry “Soulbrother” Fowden – Vintage Soul Radio Show
In the mid-seventies came the next phase of his career, as lead vocalist for Calla Records¹ group, Best Of Both Worlds. He qualified: The drummer, Ralph Fisher, used to play for me a long time ago. I brought him out of Frederick, Maryland, and I brought him into Baltimore. We separated, we went our separate ways and then he got a little band together called Both Worlds. Then I didn¹t have a band. I was just going from club to club singing and any band that was in the club I used. So we decided just to put the two together. There was a guy from Washington DC called Clayton Roberts, he decided to record me. I told him I was with a band, so he said well, I¹ll take both of you. That¹s how we became the Best of Both Worlds. Clayton knew Nate McCalla of Calla Records in New York. That¹s how we recorded that one record. But then, after that, everybody wanted to go their separate ways, so we split up and went our separate ways again and I was back as a soloist.²
At the end of the seventies, Winfield issued another solo single, ŒMy Love For You¹ c/w I Wanna Be With You, My Love For You being a remake of his Ru-Jac debut and also intended as the title of an album which failed to materialize. Issued on P&L Records and handled by Parkerhouse Distributors of Gaithersburg, Maryland, the P stood for Parker and the L for Lyles. That was my own record label, he said. Lyles was a lady that was managing me at the time, Mary Lyles. This scribe had wondered if it might have been one-time Mrs. Berry Gordy, Raynoma Lyles. Laughing, Winfield responded: No, it wasn¹t her. Maybe if it was her I would have made some money! (Incidentally, Winfield¹s most recent cd to date, the gospel set entitled ŒSending Up My Timber¹, is dedicated to the memory of Rufus Mitchell – 1909-2003.
Almost inevitably, disco contributed to a reduction in the number of venues suitable for a performer like Parker. After that, things went rather quiet, Winfield said. We just weren¹t getting any work. I did some personal appearances for a while but it was very here and there, you know, nothing much…Instead, he hooked up with Knight Brother, Richard Dunbar and became the second half of the Knight Brothers. Yes, we did get together for a while. I was singing in the clubs in Washington DC and the work wasn¹t too plentiful so Richard Knight, as he called himself then – the other Knight brother had been a guy named [Jimmy] Diggs – they had been singing together and Diggs disappeared somewhere. Richard and I were singing at the same club and he said man you and I ought to do some things together, so that¹s when we started singing as the Knight Brothers. That lasted for about a couple of years. We travelled on down through the South but then the work fell off again and Richard started singing with the Drifters and I started singing gospel.
The liner notes to Winfield Parker & Praise¹s Sending Up My Timber cd – reviewed in issue #31 – suggest the gospel conversion¹ may have come about due to some personal legal problems. Winfield, now an ordained minister, added I don¹t know if it was always in the blood or not. I was actually ordained in 81 but then I started doing the r&b again. What happened was that, in 85, I got in some trouble. And I just promised the Lord that, if I got out of that trouble, I would just continue to sing gospel. Then I recorded my first gospel cd, I¹ve Come A Long Way, with Milt Matthews. It did pretty good so I just stuck in with it. So some good came out of those troubles and, about four years ago, I went back in the church again full time.
A lot of soul singers, once having adopted the mantle of gospel, will say that they no longer wish to perform or record secular material. Not so Winfield… As a matter of fact, I¹m working with my management company on coming to England, to come over and do my r&b music for my great UK fans. I¹ve known that my music is still played all over Europe and my fans know all the words to my songs. Man, I¹m ready for that – and my show is fantastic. I¹m ready! We¹re working on these plans right now. None of my songs back in the day were songs of what you might say would say come to bed or all that stuff. They were what you would call love songs. I¹m packed and ready to come to England. You know, I¹ve never been there, not even with Little Richard.
Winfield’s gospel product has included four cds – the first, the aforementioned I¹ve Come A Long Way, in 1988 – which appeared on his own BP Records, while the 2002 set, I¹m So Glad Jesus Is Mine was on R&M Records. He said, I went to R&M Records because I ran out of money to keep producing myself and I thought they could get the job done. But they couldn¹t really get the job done so I went back to my label and I did two songs and I took them up to Frank Lipsius of Jamie/Guyden in Philadelphia and Frank loved the songs. So we went on from there.
The result was the aforementioned Sending Up My Timber cd, issued by Guyden records and, like its predecessor, billed as by Winfield Parker & Praise. Praise comprises (Winfield¹s wife) Sarah Parker, Vanessa Hunter and Emily Watson and, to quote from the liner notes: Winfield said The Lord led me to get background singers, whom I scanned for voice as well as spiritual feeling. Eventually, they all became family members or very close friends… In the new millennium, Winfield added a five-piece band for their live performances. His organist played guitar in the Imperial Thrillers way back when.
Yes, there is unity in a life that has been steeped in music and eventually brought understanding and peace regardless of the ups and downs of an active and turbulent life… About the organist, Winfield qualified: He used to be my guitar player when we won the battle of the bands¹ and then he went into service. When he had come out of service, he had stopped playing guitar and then he started playing organ. He added, Praise are not singing on all of [the tracks]. Al Johnson, who used to be with the Unifics and who co-arranged the Best of Both Worlds album, he produced Sending Up My Timbe¹ and I Don¹t Know About Tomorrow and he did the arrangement, the background vocals and all. He¹s still around. As a matter of fact, he¹s working on a couple of songs for me now. He¹s in the gospel market and he¹s working a lot with a guy called Jeff Majors. So he¹s doing a lot of things in the studio with him and then he¹s doing some live performances with him.
Meanwhile, Winfield is not resting on his laurels… We do quite a bit of touring. We do some up north but mostly our touring is down south: the Carolinas, Georgia, Florida. We do a lot of that… And we do a lot of things with Doctor Bobby Jones, the tv broadcaster. He has a gospel show. I¹ve done a number of live shows with Doctor Jones as well as appearances on his television show.
I’ve appeared with the best: the Mighty Clouds Of Joy, Dorothy Norwood, Vickie Winans, Pastor John P. Kee, the Soul Strirrers, Lee Williams, Luther Barnes, the Jackson Southernaires, Slim and the Supreme Angels… and that¹s just to name a few! And future recording plans? I¹ve recently signed with Bunny Sigler to record two of his great gospel compositions. Bunny is an outstanding composer. These are in the works as we speak. I¹m also in talks with Al Johnson to record two of his songs, which I expect to be on my new cd.
Finally, Winfield had some exciting news regarding the Ru-Jac label… ³I¹m working on a reissue of my Ru-Jac recordings, ŒThe Best Of Winfield Parker. In fact, I hold the entire Ru-Jac catalogue as sole owner and will be working on its release in its entirety for the very first time. Mister Mitchell and I had a special relationship. He treated me like a son, that¹s why I have it. Only those people who have these 45s in their personal collection have been fortunate enough to have heard these songs but now I¹m ready to release Ru-Jac to the world. Now what gets better than that?
Courtesy of David Cole, Editor in Chief, “In the Basement Magazine” Interview with Winfield Parker, October, 2004.
Also, see “Uncloudy Days – Encyclopedia of Gospel Music” (Page 323, Winfield Parker)
Winfield Parker 