Aubrey Johnson
Biography
Aubrey Johnson is a New York-based vocalist, composer, and educator who specializes in jazz, Brazilian, and creative contemporary music with and without words. She holds a Master of Music degree in jazz performance from the New England Conservatory.
As an undergraduate student Western Michigan University, Aubrey was a member of Gold Company, the university’s world- renowned vocal jazz ensemble, and studied classical and jazz voice. As a college student, Aubrey won two DownBeat Collegiate Student Music Awards for “Best Jazz Vocalist” and “Jazz Vocalist, Outstanding Performance.” She recorded and performed the original compositions of pianist Ron DiSalvio, featuring legendary drummer Jimmy Cobb. Her work with Cobb/DiSalvio can be heard on their 2007 Origin Records release “Essence of Green”, and “Songs For Jazz Legends” (BluJazz, 2015).
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In 2007 she relocated to Boston to pursue a Masters Degree in Jazz Performance at the New England Conservatory, where she studied with Danilo Perez, Jerry Bergonzi, Dominique Eade, Allan Chase, George Garzone, and Frank Carlberg. While at NEC, Aubrey founded, directed and arranged for an official vocal jazz ensemble at the school. In 2009, Aubrey graduated with honors, was awarded the “Gunther Schuller Medal” for “making an extraordinary contribution to the life of the school,” and won her third DownBeat Magazine Collegiate Student Music Award, for outstanding performance in jazz voice.
While earning a master’s degree from New England Conservatory, where she studied with pianist Frank Carlberg and vocalist Dominique Eade, Johnson discovered the freedom that comes with abandoning certain musical norms. Consequently, Unraveled shimmers with harmonic wanderlust. “I do a lot of modulating to different key centers, and never hold myself to the idea that I have to come back to where I started,” she said.
Her lyrics reflect that freedom, too. She explained that when she’s writing a piece, the melody and lyric often materialize in tandem—but only for the first phrase. “That’s the magic inspiration moment,” she said, adding that “rational-minded” compositional work quickly follows.
Johnson—who teaches at Berklee College of Music, Montclair State University and Queens College—often follows a maxim: “While I have an understanding of the rules, I should never feel like I have to adhere to them.”
During the past decade, vocalist Aubrey Johnson has explored different chambers of her artistry and performed with an array of musicians, including singers Bobby McFerrin and Sara Serpa, as well as Brian Carpenter’s Ghost Train Orchestra. Johnson’s leader debut, Unraveled (Outside In)—a program featuring original compositions and new sextet arrangements of standards—takes listeners on a dramatic journey through her intriguing aesthetic.
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