Canadian collaborative pianist Amanda Johnston is Associate Professor of Music at the University of Mississippi where she acts as Music Director/Vocal Coach for the Opera Theatre, teaches courses in advanced diction, and coaches students at the undergraduate and graduate level. She is also on faculty at Musiktheater Bavaria (Oberaudorf, Germany) and the Druid City Opera Workshop (Tuscaloosa, AL). She is author of English and German Diction for Singers: A Comparative Approach, 2nd edition (Rowman & Littlefield, 2016), highly praised in the Journal of Singing for “enlivening the study of diction.” Her CD recordings include Pleas to Famous Fairies with Linda Lister, soprano (Albany Records, 2018); Métissage with Adam Estes, saxophone (MSR Classics, 2017); and Mahler: Rückert-Lieder with Julia Morgan, mezzo-soprano (MSR Classics, 2012).
Johnston’s research on comparative diction and lesser-known composers of the German lied has been presented at conferences held by the International Congress of Voice Teachers (ICVT), College Music Society (CMS), National Association of Teachers of Singing (NATS), National Opera Association (NOA), and Song Collaborators Consortia (SCC). Since 2017, she has served as Editor-in-Chief of The Opera Journal, a peer-reviewed online journal published biannually by the National Opera Association. Further, she is quite active as a clinician, presenting masterclasses and lectures across the USA. Previous appointments were held at the University of Toronto, Royal Conservatory of Music, York University, Taos Opera Institute, and Lied Austria.
She has received prestigious grants from the Canada Council for the Arts and the Ontario Arts Council to work with masters in the field of collaborative piano, most notably Malcolm Martineau, Rudolf Jansen, Martin Isepp, Dalton Baldwin, and Helmut Deutsch. Further professional development took her to the Franz-Schubert-Institut (Baden bei Wien, Austria); Académie Francis Poulenc (Tours); Académie internationale d’été (Nice); Oxenfoord International Summer School (St. Andrews); and the Aspen Music Festival.
Amanda Johnston has been broadcast on CBC Radio 2, NPR, Classical 96.3 FM, and CKWR, and has performed in Hong Kong, Sweden, Germany, France, Austria, Scotland, Canada, and the United States. She was educated at Queen’s University, the Hochschule für Musik “Franz Liszt” (Weimar, Germany), and the Janáček Academy of Music (Brno, Czech Republic). www.amandajohnston.ca
