About

 

For bookings or private lessons, please contact Darren at darrenjohnston5000@gmail.com. 

“Someone to watch, on trumpet of course, but as a composer and bandleader as well.”
– John Corbett, Downbeat Magazine

“Johnston explores the limits of his instrument with a hankering for originality…running away and never looking back.”
– San Francisco Bay Guardian, “Pick of the Week,”

“fantastic…with a big bell tone and a tart phrasing style that really cuts through.”
– Signal to Noise #48.

“a resourceful improviser who writes vivid, episodic themes.”
– Downbeat Magazine, “25  Trumpeters for the Future.”

 

About Darren Johnston

Canada-born trumpeter/composer Darren Johnston works primarily within jazz, jazz adjacent, and purely improvised music, while also studying and performing many other styles, including music of the Balkans, Jamaica (Groundation), contemporary classical, and more. He is particularly drawn to music that defies categorization.

After twenty one years in the Bay Area, Johnston relocated to Brooklyn, NY in 2019.   In the time since moving there, he has played and/or recorded with Ches Smith, Dayna Stephens, Carmen Staaf, Michael Formanek, Tony Malaby, Michael Attias, Slavic Soul Party!, Raya Brass Band, The Peter Hess Quartet, Michael Vatcher, and many more.

As a composer he has written for ensembles ranging from small jazz groups, to big-bands, brass bands, string quartets, choirs, rock bands, and countless combinations thereof.  He has been commissioned to write for dance, dance film, theater, video games, and by museums such as San Francisco’s De Young Museum, and other presenting organizations such as the Yerba Buena Garden Festival, and Intersection For The Arts.

He has performed and/or recorded with luminaries such as Marshall Allen, Gerald Cleaver, Fred Frith, ROVA Sax Quartet, Ben Goldberg, Allison Miller, Mark Dresser, Myra Melford, Marcus Shelby, Pete Escovedo, Erik Jekabson’s “Electric Squeezebox Orchestra,” and many others, across the USA and around the world, including at festivals such as Monterey Jazz Festival, Montreal Jazz Festival, Hyde Park Jazz Festival, and others. . 

As a bandleader, past projects include The United Brassworkers Front, The Nice Guy Trio, The Darren Johnston Quintet, The Pipes, Broken Shadows Family Band, Trans-Global People’s Chorus, and innumerable one-offs.   Current projects include the Chicago-based Life In Time, featuring Geof Bradfield, Clark Sommers, and Dana Hall, a NYC-based trio, Breathing Room, featuring Carmen Staaf, and Michael Formanek, the NYC-based Wild Awake quintet, featuring Dayna Stephens, Jacob Sacks, Sean Conly, and Ches Smith, and the long-running horn trio Spectral, featuring saxophonists Larry Ochs and Dave Rempis.  An all-Canadian collective quartet, temporarily put on hold by the pandemic, is now preparing to pick up where it left off, featuring Anna Webber, Michael Bates, and Toronto-based Nick Fraser.

As an educator Johnston has taught at Stanford Jazz Workshop’s summer program and throughout the year in their “Giant Steps” program, Jazz Camp West, The Jazzschool, and as an adjunct at UC Berkeley.  As a guest lecturer he has been invited to present master classes on free improvisation, holistic approaches to music theory and practice, and an introduction to music of the Balkans at institutions such as Sonoma State University,  Cal Arts, and others.