As a child, Jeanne loved to sit under the piano in the magnificent flood of sound as her mother practiced.  Jeanne JohnsonAt age five, she started both violin and piano.  She made her solo violin debut with orchestra at 11, and won first place in the Milwaukee Symphony Youth Soloist Competition at 16.  Her love of music was fanned by three wonderful summers at Interlochen Arts Camp in Michigan, and she went on to receive her Bachelor’s Degree in Performance with Honors from Indiana University, where she studied with James Buswell and Stanley Ritchie and participated in the Early Music Institute.  She received her Master’s Degree with Distinction in Performance and Academics from New England Conservatory, where she served as James Buswell’s graduate assistant.  She pursued further studies in summer programs at the Sarasota Music Festival, the Bach Aria Festival and the Banff Centre.

Today Jeanne is a soloist, chamber and orchestral musician on both Baroque and modern violin. Her performances on series, tours, festivals and recordings in the United States and abroad have been hailed as “stunningly effusive” and “delivered with gusto.” Her music can be heard around the world, from Brazil to Indonesia, Sweden to Turkey. A winner of an Early Music America Professional Development Award in 2002, Jeanne gave a recital at the Yale University Collection of Musical Instruments in 2005, and has been featured on several radio broadcasts including Harmonia, Performance Today, Sunday Baroque, and WNYC. Performances by her Baroque trio Music of the Spheres include The Frick Collection; the Tage Alter Musik festival in Regensburg, Germany; the Berkeley Early Music Festival mainstage; the Bloomington Early Music Festival; the San Francisco Early Music Society; Indianapolis Early Music; and four recordings on Magnatune. In 2016, Centaur Records released Jeanne’s recordings of violin works by Johann Jakob Walther and Jean-Fery Rebel with Eco dell’Anima. Jeanne has been concertmaster of the Washington Bach Consort, Atlanta Baroque Orchestra, and Orchestra Atlanta, and has performed, recorded and toured with numerous groups including Tafelmusik, Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra, Portland Baroque Orchestra, Chatham Baroque, Musica nel Chiostro in Tuscany, Bloomington Baroque, the Magnolia Baroque Festival, the Carmel Bach Festival, Asheville Baroque (including a concert at the Viola da Gamba Society 2018 Conclave), North Carolina Baroque Orchestra, Bach Akademie Charlotte Festival, Atlanta Symphony, Charleston Symphony and Chattanooga Symphony.

On the other end of the spectrum, Jeanne has toured with Vince Gill and Amy Grant, and has performed and recorded with the Nashville Chamber Orchestra, Turtle Island String Quartet and guitarist John Jorgenson, spanning styles from country to the gypsy jazz of Django Reinhardt. She served as orchestra director and violin faculty at Clayton State University, and has worked as a classical radio host, costumed historic interpreter, and Renaissance festival and Shakespeare company character and musician. She also writes and paints and is an avid old movie fan.

 Jeanne Violin

Jeanne is available for concerts, recitals, concerto solos, series, festivals, tours, advanced master classes, and recordings.  Her Music of the Spheres recordings are available on Magnatune, CDBaby, Amazon, iTunes, Napster, Zune, MediaNet, MySpace Music, Verizon, Last.fm, Lala, Tradebit, Nokia, GreatIndieMusic, Deezer, & LimeWire.  They are also available on moodmixes.com, background music for businesses and retail stores.

To hear more of Jeanne’s music, go to the Listen tab on this web site.