Tom Johnson, Cross Rhythms, Silkscreen on cloth, 146.5 × 139 cm, Edition of 21
Courtesy of Archivio Conz, Berlin
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Tom Johnson (b. 1939 in Greeley, Colorado, USA, lives and works in Paris, France) is an American minimalist composer. His ability to combine music, mathematical structures, and written and visual language has contributed to the evolution of new reflections in contemporary music. His sounds and formulas are pared down to essentials, proximate to those of Alvin Lucier and Phill Niblock. From 1972 to 1982, Johnson was the New Music critic of the exceptional Village Voice newspaper, covering the inception and development of minimal music in New York. Johnson wrote about the most outstanding composers and musicians of his time, including Steve Reich, Alvin Lucier, Nam June Paik, La Monte Young. The book The Voice of New Music, published in 1983, is an anthology of his articles. The same year, Johnson settled in Paris and married Esther Ferrer. In 2001, he received the Contemporary Composition Prize at the Victoires de la Musique. Besides having performed internationally, Johnson’s discography counts more than thirty titles. Since 2018, he has been curating the Illustrated Music series on his YouTube channel, dedicated entirely to explaining his scores and notations.
