James Johnston

James Johnstone teaches early keyboards at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, and at Trinity College of Music in London. For many years he has been a principal of the Gabrieli Consort and Players and as such has contributed to their many award-winning CDs. Recent projects have included recitals in El Escorial (Festival Siglio d'Oro), Iceland (Skalholt Music festival), Antwerp (Festival Laus Polyphoniae) Basel, Krakow, Oxford and Edinburgh, as well as his fifth solo CD, a recording of the complete keyboard works of Peeter Cornet, released July 2005 on Gaudeamus. Since Autumn 2001 he has been a core member of the chamber ensemble Florilegium with whom he has made CDs of Telemann, Haydn and Bolivian baroque music, and has toured the UK, Europe and North and South America.

James has performed throughout Europe and The United States with most of the established period instrument ensembles in England including The Academy of Ancient Music, Collegium Musicum 90, The Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, The King's Consort, The English Concert, although his main work has been as a principal of the Gabrieli Consort and Players. He has contributed to their many award-winning CDs, notably the 'Epiphany Mass' CD on Deutsche Grammophon on which he performed some Bach organ solos.

James has recorded and performed throughout Europe and the United States as a soloist and continuo player. In recent years he has given solo recitals in Holland, Germany, Switzerland, Denmark, Spain, Israel and Colombia. His first solo CD - 'John Blow's Anthology' - was critically acclaimed; in 1999 his CD of keyboard works by Orlando Gibbons on ASV received the prestigious Deutsche Schallplattenkritik prize. Spring 2001 saw the release of a Bach recital recorded on the historic Christian Müller organ in the Waalse Kerk, Amsterdam.

Recent projects have included recitals in El Escorial, Iceland (Skalholt Music festival) and Antwerp (Festival Laus Polyphoniae) as well as CD recordings of Ercole Pasquini (released Spring 2003) and Peeter Cornet released 2005), both for Gaudeamus.

He teaches early keyboards at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, and at Trinity College of Music in London.

Since Autumn 2001 as a core member of the chamber ensemble Florilegium he has made CDs of Telemann, Haydn and Bolivian baroque music, and has toured the UK, Europe and the Americas.