Description
Emma Johnson Folk Song Suite
(Fantasy on Three folk songs: The Lark in the Clear Air, Down by the Salley Gardens and Tom he Was a Piper's Son)
Glazunov Reverie Oriental for clarinet and strings
Shostakovich String Quartet No. 8 in C minor
Mozart Clarinet Quintet in A major, K581
Emma Johnson, clarinet
Emma Johnson is one of the few clarinettists to have established a career as a solo performer. Emma grew up in London and her career was launched when at the age of 17 she won BBC Young Musician of the Year followed by the Young Concert Artists Auditions in New York. She studied Music and English at Pembroke College, Cambridge before embarking on music full time and since then she has performed all over the world.
Johnson has made 30 recordings to date; tracks from her recent album with the BBC Concert Orchestra, English Fantasy, have been streamed 5 million times on Spotify. Voyage and The Mozart Album on the Universal label were also classical chart-topping successes and Johnson's CD of Brahms sonatas with John Lenehan was described as "definitive" in The Observer, whilst her recording of Stanford and Finzi Concertos was nominated for a Gramophone Award.
Emma Johnson is also a composer; books of her arrangements and compositions have been published by Chesters, Fabers and Encore Publications. Songs of Celebration, Johnson's composition for clarinet and choir, has recently been performed in Dublin, London and Tokyo and she has written a clarinet concerto Tree of Life which has numerous performances planned with her hand-picked Orchestra For the Environment. A series of new solo clarinet pieces has been published by Queen's Temple Publishing.
In 2020 Emma Johnson was awarded the Cobbett Medal for distinguished services to chamber music from the Musicians' Company Guild in the City of London. She loves to collaborate with other musicians and also directs her own ensemble, Emma Johnson and Friends, whose recent live recording of the Schubert Octet was critically acclaimed. Working with artists as diverse as Sir Yehudi Menuhin and Dame Cleo Laine, Emma is known for her eclectic programming; amongst the programmes she offers are Tales of Vienna and Clarinet Goes to Town.
Emma Johnson’s TV appearances range from a recital for Sky Arts TV to gala concerts including a recent televised Prom. Emma played the popular theme for The Victorian Kitchen Garden on BBC TV (winning a Novello Award). Videos of her performances and masterclasses can be seen on her YouTube channel.
Her radio work includes Artist of the Week for both BBC Radio 3 and Classic FM as well as for radio stations around the world and she has been a featured guest on programmes such as Woman's Hour and World at One. Her broadcasts about the composer Finzi and the poet Milton were both chosen as Pick of the Week and she is often invited to give talks, including recently Comedy Classical, an exploration of humour in music, for The Arts Society.
Emma has given masterclasses throughout the world and she has devised a project, Instrument Stories, delivered by the charitable Emma Johnson Music Foundation, to increase awareness of instrumental music in UK primary schools.
Emma has appeared as soloist with many of the world’s leading orchestras in repertoire which includes all the major clarinet works as well as pieces written especially for her by Sir John Dankworth, Will Todd, Patrick Hawes, Matthew Taylor and Sir Michael Berkeley amongst others.
Emma was the first woman to be made an Honorary Fellow of Pembroke College, Cambridge and in 2017 the college commissioned a portrait of her. She enjoys running and is also a keen lover of nature. She is a patron of ClicSargent, and Ronald Mcdonald House Charities.
She was honoured by the Queen with an M.B.E. in 1996.
Emma plays an instrument made by the English clarinet maker, Peter Eaton.
"Emma Johnson has realised what lies at the heart of music making when it is at its best: she does not just perform but uses the music to communicate something wonderful."
The Gildas Quartet
The Gildas Quartet, praised for their ‘energy, verve and refreshing approach’ have performed to critical acclaim at major venues including the Bridgewater Hall, Barbican, Wigmore Hall and live on BBC Radio 3. Their bold and explorative approach to performance has been recognised by the International Franz Schubert and Modern Music Competition, Graz, where they won first prize in the Audience Engagement Award 2018.
Determined to bring the visceral experience of string quartet performance to audiences at close quarters, the Gildas launched their immersive ‘Surround Sound Sessions’ project in Winter 2019. This series ranges from short one-work ‘pop-up’ concerts in unusual settings to full-length recitals, with the audience literally in the midst of the players, in surround sound. In May 2020, the Gildas Quartet received an award from the Help Musicians UK Do It Differently Fund, which supported the continuation of their Surround Sound Sessions project remotely, under the dramatically different circumstances that the pandemic brought about.
Passionate advocates of music from all periods, the Gildas have collaborated with many eminent British composers. The Quartet has been privileged to work with Sir Harrison Birtwistle, Colin Matthews and Michael Finnissy, and commissioned Philip Cashian’s String Quartet No. 2, which was given its premiere by the Quartet at the St Magnus Festival in Orkney. The quartet’s recording of two works by Cheryl Frances-Hoad was released to critical acclaim on the Champs Hill label in 2020.
The Quartet has given recitals at international festivals such as Cheltenham, Lake District Summer Music and Oxford Lieder, as well as touring in Europe, China and South Africa. They are City Music Foundation Artists and former Junior Fellows at the Birmingham Conservatoire. They have frequently been featured by the Park Lane Group and are grateful for awards and support from the Arts Council, Britten Pears Foundation, Tunnell and Richard Carne Trusts.
