Listen – Owen Johnson, Composer

Below are recordings of a few select works by Owen Johnson. For more recordings, visit his Soundcloud here.

Metis

Metis was written in 2022 and read and recorded by the New England Conservatory Philharmonic. Metis is a shapeshifter in Greek mythology who Zeus tricked into turning into a fly, soon after eating her. This piece is inspired by Metis’s power of transfiguration, shown musically through rapidly changing textures and sections that meld and blend into each other.

Two Movements for Organ

Two Movements for Organ was composed in 2022 for my good friend and colleague, Jacob Gruss. The first movement, a toccata-like burst of energy gives way to a meditative fugue interspersed with elaborations of a lyrical theme.

Preludes

This is a collection of my piano preludes, a continual process of creating short piano pieces, each with an adjective to describe them. Preludes performed by the composer.

It Comes in Waves

It Comes in Waves was written in 2021 and Performed by Olga Kaminsky at the Tuesday Night New Music concert series at NEC. This piece is based on the feeling of missing someone dear to you, a feeling that comes in waves. I wrote it at the beginning of the semester, when I was dealing a lot with those feelings. Composing this piece, in a way, helped me to come to terms with them. Throughout the piece, I aim to use the natural resonance of the violin, taking advantage of natural harmonics and open strings. This contrasts with more chromatic and driving passages, creating a push and pull in the piece. The piece opens slowly, with the open G and D strings, with a natural harmonic being added to the D string. This sets up the “open” feeling that will be explored in the rest of the piece. What follows is a section very high in the register of the violin, once again taking advantage of natural and artificial harmonics. Next, a flowing, grounded, melody low in the violin, different than what came before. The opening to the piece sets up the main contrasts that will be explored throughout: high and low, open and constricted, turbulent and tranquil. These contrasts are the “waves” of feeling that are constant yet unpredictable.

Wool

Wool is a solo French horn piece composed at the 2020 Curtis Young Artists Summer Program. It was originally performed by Gabriel Kovach of the Phoenix Symphony. This performance is by Sophie Steger, at NEC’s Jordan Hall.

Cascades

Cascades is a piece for String Quartet composed for the Boston Conservatory High School Composition Intensive and performed by the Worcester Chamber Music Society. Contrapuntally exploring a cascading motif throughout the piece, three variations of the motif continually build in intensity before slowly fading away. The climax comes when the string quartet halts and plays a series of pan-diatonic chords that hearken back to the opening, before a final fourth variation brings the piece back down to a whisper, all four instruments holding on an “a”. Cascades comments on the meaning of form, with each section having a clear beginning, middle, and end. Emotion is evoked from the feeling of predictability, yet the piece lingers long enough for a satisfying conclusion.