David Johnson was born in San Pedro, a suburb of Los Angeles, California, beginning his music studies at the age of eight. Even during his earliest years he showed an affinity for works of Beethoven, Schubert, and Brahms, expressing them with deep poetry which has become a characteristic of his playing. As a student at the University of Redlands he majored in both piano and composition, being awarded first prize in the Redlands Bowl competition while he earned his degree Magna cum laude. He received his Master’s Degree with distinction from the Manhattan School of Music, where he was a pupil of the late Isabelle Yalkovskyy Byman. Further studies were with the distinguished Rumanian pedagogue Carola Grindea. His highly successful New York debut in September, 1980 was followed with equal enthusiasm by audiences and critics alike on both sides of the Atlantic. His ability to communicate directly to his audiences whatever he is playing makes each concert a delight. New York Times critic Peter G. Davis called Mr. Johnson “a pianist of delicate sensibilities [whose reading of Ravel’s Le Tombeau de Couperin was] characterized by a refinement of phrasing and coloristic precision that allowed each bejeweled movement to glisten with its own individual lustre.” The eminent Dutch critic Jan van Voorthuvsen labeled him “a pianist and poet of distinction.”