David C. Johnson

Biography

David C. Johnson (January 30, 1940, in Batavia, New York – October 28, 2021, in Basel) was an American composer, flautist, and performer of live electronic music.

Life and career

Johnson studied, among other places, at Harvard University (M.A. in composition 1964), with Nadia Boulanger in Paris, and at the Cologne Courses for New Music in 1964–1965, 1965–1966, and 1966–1967.

In 1966–1967, he was an independent collaborator at the Electronic Studio of the WDR, where he assisted Karlheinz Stockhausen with the production of his electronic work Hymnen. He also operated the live-electronics in the first performances of the chamber-orchestra version of Stockhausen's Mixtur (1967), and in the Darmstadt collaborative works directed by Stockhausen, Ensemble in 1967 and Musik für ein Haus in 1968.
In 1968, Johnson was instructor of electronic music at the Cologne Courses for New Music. From its formation in Cologne in 1968, he collaborated with the experimental beat group, later known as Can, formed by bass guitarist Holger Schüring (later known as Holger Czukay), keyboardist Irmin Schmidt, guitarist Michael Karoli and drummer Jaki Liebezeit. He left in 1969, disappointed at their growing rock influences and, according to Irmin, the lack of patience for band's vocalist, Malcolm Mooney, "with his craziness and spontaneity and totally unforeseen sudden outbursts". Johnson also added that the group "demanded too much unstrained dedication, which cannot be mustered up artificially."
In 1970, Johnson performed in a number of Stockhausen's "process" works (Spiral, Pole, Expo) at the German pavilion of Expo '70, the Osaka world's fair. After Osaka Johnson, together with Johannes Fritsch and Rolf Gehlhaar, founded the Feedback Studio in Cologne and became a technical collaborator in the Studio for Electronic Music of Utrecht University.
In the early 1970s, Johnson joined the Oeldorf Group, a musicians' cooperative, with Péter Eötvös, Mesías Maiguashca, Gaby Schumacher (cello) and Joachim Krist (viola), who organized a Summer Night Music series. Performances were held in the barn attached to the group's farmhouse in Oeldorf, near Kürten.
In 1972, with Helmut Lachenmann, he coordinated the Composition Studio at the Darmstadt International Summer Courses for New Music. He remained technical director of the Feedback Studio until 1975, when he moved to Basel to become director of the electronic studio of the City of Basel Music Academy there, a post he held until 1985.
In the mid-eighties he played flute on Irmin Schmidt's soundtrack for Rote Erde TV series.
Johnson died in Basel on October 28, 2021, aged 81.

Personal life

David C. Johnson and Mary Bauermeister (at the time married to Karlheinz Stockhausen) had a daughter Sofie (born July 1972).

Cited sources

Gehlhaar, Rolf. 1968. Zur Komposition Ensemble: Kompositionsstudio Karlheinz Stockhausen, Internationale Ferienkurse für Neue Musik, Darmstadt 1967. Darmstädter Beiträge zur Neuen Musik 11. Edited by Ernst Thomas. Mainz: B. Schott’s Söhne. Text in both German and English.
Kurtz, Michael. 1992. Stockhausen: A Biography. Translated by Richard Toop. London: Faber and Faber.
Ritzel, Fred. 1970. Musik für ein Haus: Kompositionsstudio Karlheinz Stockhausen, Internationale Ferienkurse für Neue Musik, Darmstadt 1968. Darmstädter Beiträge zur Neuen Musik 12. Edited by Ernst Thomas. Mainz: B. Schott’s Söhne.
Stockhausen, Karlheinz. 1971. Texte zur Musik 3 (1963–1970). Edited by Dieter Schnebel. Cologne: Verlag M. DuMont Schauberg.