James P. Johnson

Did You Know?

• On September 16, 1995, the U.S. Post Office issued a James P. Johnson 32-cent commemorative postage stamp.
• Johnson's grave at Mount Olivet Cemetery was unmarked from his death in 1955 until 2009, when a headstone was placed with funds raised by the James P. Johnson Foundation, Spike Wilner, and Scott Brown.
• In 2020, Johnson's song "Carolina Shout" was added to the Grammy Hall of Fame.

Biography

James P. Johnson entered the world on February 1, 1894, in New Brunswick, New Jersey. Living so close to New York City meant he could soak up everything from rowdy barroom tunes to refined symphony performances. His father, William H. Johnson, worked as a store helper and mechanic, while his mother, Josephine Harrison, cleaned houses and sang in the Methodist Church choir, having taught herself to play piano. Johnson often pointed to the African-American songs and dances he encountered at home and around town as his earliest musical inspirations. In 1908, the family relocated to New York’s San Juan Hill neighborhood, near where Lincoln Center now stands, and moved farther uptown in 1911.

Blessed with perfect pitch and a sharp memory, Johnson could easily replicate piano melodies he’d heard. He grew up on Scott Joplin’s ragtime and maintained a connection to that era, performing and recording Joplin’s “Maple Leaf Rag” and the more challenging “Euphonic Sounds” several times during the 1940s. He landed his first piano gig in 1912 and decided to skip school in favor of a music career. Between 1913 and 1916, he studied European classical piano with Bruto Giannini. Over the next few years, he sharpened his ragtime skills by watching other pianists and writing his own rags.

In 1914, while performing in Newark, New Jersey, alongside singer Lillie Mae Wright—whom he married three years later—Johnson met Willie “The Lion” Smith. The two clicked instantly, sharing similar views on showmanship and stage presence, and became best friends. Starting in 1918, Johnson and Wright toured together with the Smart Set Revue, then returned to New York in 1919. By 1920, Johnson had built a reputation as a top East Coast pianist, on par with Eubie Blake and Luckey Roberts. From 1917 to 1927, he cut dozens of player piano rolls for labels like Aeolian, Perfection, Artempo, Rythmodik, and QRS, initially capturing his own ragtime pieces. During this stretch, he crossed paths with George Gershwin, another young piano-roll artist at Aeolian.

Compositions

James P. Johnson was a key figure in the Harlem Stride piano style, alongside Fats Waller, Willie "The Lion" Smith, and Luckey Roberts. His composition "Carolina Shout" served as a standard test piece for pianists of the era; Duke Ellington learned it note for note from a 1921 QRS piano roll Johnson made. Johnson taught Waller and helped him secure his first piano roll and recording jobs. His work for the musical theatre produced many hits, most famously "Charleston," which debuted in his 1923 Broadway show Runnin' Wild, though some believe he had written it years earlier. That song became a defining hit of the Roaring Twenties. Other well-known tunes include "If I Could Be With You (One Hour Tonight)," "You've Got to Be Modernistic," "Don't Cry, Baby," "Keep off the Grass," "Old Fashioned Love," "A Porter's Love Song to a Chambermaid," and "Snowy Morning Blues." Johnson also wrote waltzes, ballet, symphonic pieces, and light opera, many of which survive in manuscript form at the Institute of Jazz Studies at Rutgers University. His popularity earned him ASCAP membership in 1926. In 1928, his piece "Yamekraw, a Negro Rhapsody" premiered, named after a Black community in Savannah, Georgia; William Grant Still orchestrated it, and Fats Waller played piano because Johnson was busy conducting his Broadway hit "Keep Shufflin." Johnson later composed "Harlem Symphony," performed at Carnegie Hall in 1945, and collaborated with Langston Hughes on the one-act opera "De Organizer."

CD re-issues

Several CD re-issues document Johnson's work. Mosaic Records produced the box Classic James P. Johnson Sessions, 1921-1944, including all piano solos, band sides, and blues accompaniments for major commercial labels except Decca/Brunswick and RCA Victor. The Blue Note Jazzmen (2xCD) from 1998 collects Johnson's complete Blue Note recordings. Father of the Stride Piano (CBS/Sony) re-issues a Columbia LP with recordings from 1921 to 1939, including solos like "Carolina Shout" and "Worried and Lonesome Blues. The Biograph label re-issued about 60 of Johnson's piano rolls from 1917 to 1927. The Decca CD Snowy Morning Blues contains 20 sides recorded between 1930 and 1944, including a Fats Waller Memorial set and solos "Jingles" and "You've Got to be Modernistic. Johnson also appears in Mosaic re-issues of the Commodore and HRS labels. A book of musical transcriptions of Johnson's piano roll performances has been prepared by Robert Pinsker.

Further reading and listening

David Schiff wrote a portrait and review of the re-premier of Johnson's Harlem Symphony in The New York Times on February 16, 1992. Scott E. Brown authored A Case of Mistaken Identity: The Life and Music of James P. Johnson, published by Scarecrow Press in 1984, part of a series from the Institute of Jazz Studies at Rutgers University. An accompanying YouTube playlist was compiled by Mark Borowsky. Jazz Rhythm Programs No. 174, 137, 138, and 139, produced by Dave Radlauer with guest Mark Borowsky, focus on Johnson. A lecture titled "Fats Waller and James P. Johnson: Student/Teacher, Protege/Master, Colleagues/Best Friends" was given at the Fats Waller Centennial Conference in 2004. Another lecture, "From Joplin to Blake to Johnson: A Ragtime Triple Play," was given at the Sutter Creek Ragtime Festival in 2002. BBC Radio 3 featured Johnson as Composer of the Week from November 9 to 13, 2020. Riccardo Scivales's book Jazz Piano: The Left Hand covers Johnson's left-hand techniques.