Texas Tech University College of Visual & Performing Arts
and the School of Music Present:
Mary Jane Johnson, Internationally recognized Metropolitan
Opera Soprano and Texas Tech alumna, in concert
Thursday, November 9, 2006
8 p.m.
Hemmle Recital Hall-Music Building
Admission Free and Open to the Public
Ms. Johnson will be featured in recital later this month at the
Weill Recital Hall of Carnegie Hall, New York City. No stranger
to the New York audiences, she has sung in New York and
opera stages around the world, including the famous La Scala
of Milan, Italy. The recital at Texas Tech is a preview of the
New York recital, and is offered as a gift to the University and
the Lubbock community. James Gardner will accompany on
piano as Johnson performs arias from Strauss, Handel,
Lehar, and Puccini operas, Art Songs by Granados, Libby
Larsen's Cowboy Songs for Soprano, and James Gardner
arranged Spirituals.
Mary Jane Johnson, who graduated from Tech with a
bachelor's degree in music education in 1972, is considered
to be one of the foremost interpreters of dramatic opera
repertory. Her start, as a world-class performer, came in a
dramatic way.
The first Luciano Pavarotti International Voice Competition
was held in 1981. The prize…a performance with Pavarotti
himself. 500 singers from the far reaches of the globe applied.
The finals produced the discovery of Mary Jane Johnson,
now singing starring roles in the great opera houses of the
world. She appeared with the tenor in a televised performance
of Musetta in Puccini's “La Boheme” with the opera company
of Philadelphia. Other important highlights of Ms. Johnson's
television appearances include the nationally televised
Pavarotti Plus Gala, Live from Lincoln Center and the CBS
"Sunday Morning” with Charles Kuralt.
Mary Jane Johnson is currently an Artist Professor at
Amarillo College, since 2000 and is a native of Pampa, Texas.
She currently resides in Amarillo, Texas with her husband
David and their two children Taylor and Greer. In addition, she
was the staff vocal coach for the Santa Fe Opera from 2001-
2005.
http://www.music.ttu.edu
