Biography
'Johnson is superb' The Sunday Times
'She walks onto a concert platform and suddenly transforms herself into an expressive instrument of sublime beauty.'
The Guardian
The Guardian
'A Classical Music Superstar' Clarinet & Saxophone Magazine
Thank you for a fantastic experience today at the Emma Johnson Masterclass. The whole thing was inspirational and life-enhancing not only for the participants but also, I am sure, for teachers and parents.
Masterclass participant
I would highly recommend an Emma Johnson masterclass to any clarinet teacher; her work as a teacher/coach is on a level with her excellent performances. I have been to many masterclasses; this was one of the best.
The Clarinet (International Clarinet Association)
EMMA JOHNSON must have lost count of the number of times she has played Mozart's delicious clarinet concerto. The fact that she still makes it sounds so fresh and spontaneous is why she is such a star.
She plays with such obvious delight that it is impossible not to be totally enchanted - and the packed audience at Warwick Arts Centre certainly were last Friday.
Coventry Evening Telegraph
She plays with such obvious delight that it is impossible not to be totally enchanted - and the packed audience at Warwick Arts Centre certainly were last Friday.
Coventry Evening Telegraph
It is 20 years since clarinettist Emma Johnson won the BBC Young Musician of the Year competition.
Since then she has thrilled audiences with virtuoso performances in appearances with orchestras including the London Symphony, the Royal Philharmonic and the English Chamber Orchestra.
Bradford audiences will remember her stunning performance two years ago at the Cathedral as part of the Chamber Concert Season and in this return visit, a continuance of the Bradford Orchestral Season , she appears with the London Mozart Players as soloist and conductor.
Yet it as a solo instrumentalist that people love her best and in Weber's Second Clarinet Concerto and Tartini's Concertino for Clarinet she again produced stunning performances which the audience loved. She showed she was equally adept with the baton while conducting Haydn's Symphony no 94 in G, often referred to as the composer's Surprise symphony. Her other conducting performance was in Mozart's Symphony No. 36.
After two decades of concert appearances Emma doesn't look a day older than when she first showed audiences what a fine artist she is. This was another success for the Bradford Orchestral Concert Season.
Since then she has thrilled audiences with virtuoso performances in appearances with orchestras including the London Symphony, the Royal Philharmonic and the English Chamber Orchestra.
Bradford audiences will remember her stunning performance two years ago at the Cathedral as part of the Chamber Concert Season and in this return visit, a continuance of the Bradford Orchestral Season , she appears with the London Mozart Players as soloist and conductor.
Yet it as a solo instrumentalist that people love her best and in Weber's Second Clarinet Concerto and Tartini's Concertino for Clarinet she again produced stunning performances which the audience loved. She showed she was equally adept with the baton while conducting Haydn's Symphony no 94 in G, often referred to as the composer's Surprise symphony. Her other conducting performance was in Mozart's Symphony No. 36.
After two decades of concert appearances Emma doesn't look a day older than when she first showed audiences what a fine artist she is. This was another success for the Bradford Orchestral Concert Season.
Bradford Telegraph and Argus
The combination of English clarinettist Emma Johnson and the Galway-based Romanian ConTempo Quartet meant a truly musical gala at Castletown House on Saturday. The occasion, which concluded the 36th IIB Music in Great Irish Houses Festival - in what was properly termed its spiritual home and where it all began in 1970 - celebrated the 250th anniversary of Mozart's birth through his Clarinet Quintet.
In an engaging introduction, Emma Johnson referred to the shared conviviality of the piece with the clarinet heard 'in conversation' with the strings. And, indeed, this was how the opening Allegro sounded. Ms Johnson's interweaving, answering and echoing responses came with her uncanny sense of natural phrasing. The aria-like Larghetto movement was then beautifully paced with Emma Johnson's tone, smoky at the bottom and radiant at the top, again consistently even as she glided so gracefully from one register to the other. The Quintet's capricious Minuet was an absolute dream with Ms Johnson producing featherweight touches before moving to the serpentine paths of the Finale's fanciful variations. She and the ConTempo created the ultimate in a festival - a word much abused nowadays - event.
Separated by an almost superfluous arrangement of Tchaikovsky's melancholy piano piece "October" by Toru Takemitsu, Mozart's contrasted companion piece was the Weber Quintet. Quite different in style from the earlier masterpiece, Weber presented the clarinettist in something akin to a concerto soloist's role over glittering string accompaniment. The work showed the virtuosity as well as the consummate artistry of Emma Johnson to the full. Her playing was a tour de force of sheer musical brilliance but her performance also demonstrated the extraordinary depth of her interpretative skills.
The ConTempo Quartet were her magnificent partners. How fortunate for Galway to have such a fabulous foursome as its first 'Ensemble-in-Residence'! - Pat O'Kelly IRISH INDEPENDENT 19 JUNE 2006
In an engaging introduction, Emma Johnson referred to the shared conviviality of the piece with the clarinet heard 'in conversation' with the strings. And, indeed, this was how the opening Allegro sounded. Ms Johnson's interweaving, answering and echoing responses came with her uncanny sense of natural phrasing. The aria-like Larghetto movement was then beautifully paced with Emma Johnson's tone, smoky at the bottom and radiant at the top, again consistently even as she glided so gracefully from one register to the other. The Quintet's capricious Minuet was an absolute dream with Ms Johnson producing featherweight touches before moving to the serpentine paths of the Finale's fanciful variations. She and the ConTempo created the ultimate in a festival - a word much abused nowadays - event.
Separated by an almost superfluous arrangement of Tchaikovsky's melancholy piano piece "October" by Toru Takemitsu, Mozart's contrasted companion piece was the Weber Quintet. Quite different in style from the earlier masterpiece, Weber presented the clarinettist in something akin to a concerto soloist's role over glittering string accompaniment. The work showed the virtuosity as well as the consummate artistry of Emma Johnson to the full. Her playing was a tour de force of sheer musical brilliance but her performance also demonstrated the extraordinary depth of her interpretative skills.
The ConTempo Quartet were her magnificent partners. How fortunate for Galway to have such a fabulous foursome as its first 'Ensemble-in-Residence'! - Pat O'Kelly IRISH INDEPENDENT 19 JUNE 2006
Can it really be 20 years since I saw clarinettist Emma Johnson win the BBC Young Musician of the Year title? Now she is an international star playing everything from Mozart to pieces specially written for her by the likes of John Dankworth.
She teamed up with the Salzburg Camerata to give us a double treat - concertos by Mozart and Weber. Not only did she demonstrate her amazing technique - imperceptible breath control, mercurial dexterity, fluidity of expression-but also her infectious joie de vivre.
Her playing of Mozart's Clarinet Concerto, his last instrumental work exploited to the full the clarinet's register and brought out the sadness and the spirit. In Weber's Second Clarinet Concerto, her virtuosity radiated forth.
She teamed up with the Salzburg Camerata to give us a double treat - concertos by Mozart and Weber. Not only did she demonstrate her amazing technique - imperceptible breath control, mercurial dexterity, fluidity of expression-but also her infectious joie de vivre.
Her playing of Mozart's Clarinet Concerto, his last instrumental work exploited to the full the clarinet's register and brought out the sadness and the spirit. In Weber's Second Clarinet Concerto, her virtuosity radiated forth.
MANCHESTER EVENING NEWS
Every generation has its artists that set the standard for that and successive generations. With Brits and the world today, it is Emma Johnson...
Emma Johnson plays clarionette, whether it be little clarion or big stick, as well as anyone. Well, one might argue that she doesn't play the music - she plays with it. She moves around the stage more than Benny Goodman did in the days of swing, bringing body language to her lively, joyful renderings of staples of the clarinet literature...
Miss Johnson uses the natural characteristc of the registers, particularly at their extremes, to great effect, from gorgeous liquid low notes to piercing clarion-like high notes. She not only shapes melodic lines seductively but often shapes individual tones! That is why everything she plays seems fresh, as if being played for the very first time.
Emma Johnson plays clarionette, whether it be little clarion or big stick, as well as anyone. Well, one might argue that she doesn't play the music - she plays with it. She moves around the stage more than Benny Goodman did in the days of swing, bringing body language to her lively, joyful renderings of staples of the clarinet literature...
Miss Johnson uses the natural characteristc of the registers, particularly at their extremes, to great effect, from gorgeous liquid low notes to piercing clarion-like high notes. She not only shapes melodic lines seductively but often shapes individual tones! That is why everything she plays seems fresh, as if being played for the very first time.
Review of an American recital
The strongest and most profiled music-making of the evening came in the Mozart, with English clarinetist Emma Johnson as soloist. Playing a custom-made English instrument of burnished sonic beauty, Johnson performed the entirety of this priceless score as if singing it.
Composed at the end of Mozart's life, when opera dominated his musical thinking, the Clarinet Concerto is perfectly cabale of being read as a quasi-vocal essay, a lengthy and infinitely noble song without words. But it only works if the soloist is, as Johnson was, sensitive to the many nuances of phrasing. Johnson treated the three registers of her instrument - the dark low octave, the conversational middle range and the brilliant top, or flute register - almost as different characters engaged in some urgent dialogue.
Composed at the end of Mozart's life, when opera dominated his musical thinking, the Clarinet Concerto is perfectly cabale of being read as a quasi-vocal essay, a lengthy and infinitely noble song without words. But it only works if the soloist is, as Johnson was, sensitive to the many nuances of phrasing. Johnson treated the three registers of her instrument - the dark low octave, the conversational middle range and the brilliant top, or flute register - almost as different characters engaged in some urgent dialogue.
THE ARIZONA REPUBLIC
England's best loved clarinet player
BBC Music Magazine
Last Tuesday's recital in Durban by British clarinettist Emma Johnson, one of the world's foremost exponents of this instrument, must go down as one of the most memorable concerts in the Friends of Music series. It was a musical experience par excellence and I, for one, could not find a note out of place...
Ms Johnson's playing illustrated not only her masterful technique and wonderful breath control, but also her exceptionally sensitive response to the interpretation of the music, her dynamic characterisation being spontaneously reflected in her natural body language.
There was never a moment that one could not see or hear exactly what she was communicating in the music.
Ms Johnson's performance of Mozart's Clarinet Concerto in A K622 at the symphony concert in the Durban City Hall on Thursday was beautifully intimate, restrained and lyrical in the first movement, magically serene, with warm legato tone and some breathtaking moments in the slow movement and spirited and virtuoso in the finale...It was a pleasure and a privilege to hear this great work played with such incredible artistry.
Ms Johnson's playing illustrated not only her masterful technique and wonderful breath control, but also her exceptionally sensitive response to the interpretation of the music, her dynamic characterisation being spontaneously reflected in her natural body language.
There was never a moment that one could not see or hear exactly what she was communicating in the music.
Ms Johnson's performance of Mozart's Clarinet Concerto in A K622 at the symphony concert in the Durban City Hall on Thursday was beautifully intimate, restrained and lyrical in the first movement, magically serene, with warm legato tone and some breathtaking moments in the slow movement and spirited and virtuoso in the finale...It was a pleasure and a privilege to hear this great work played with such incredible artistry.
THE MERCURY
Ask anyone on the street to name a famous British clarinettist, and if they don't come out with Acker Bilk, the likelihood is that they will name Emma Johnson, such is the extent of her fame.
Music Teacher Magazine
Music Teacher Magazine