Despite being a relative newcomer to the crowded London music scene, Johann has already started to make an impact and is increasingly sought after as a live musician, sessionist and coach.




Background

Hailing from Malaysia, Johann arrived in London in 1998 to begin his studies at Imperial College, London. Despite the infamous academic demands of this well-known institution, he managed to write, compose for and direct a well-received student musical production, cliché, in his second year.

Music was forced to take a supporting role, however, when he graduated in 2001 and joined a firm in the City, London's financial district. He continued to develop as a musician on the side, playing in church and in various informal situations and starting to work on his songwriting. In 2004, he wrote the catchy tune "When Will We Meet?" (which he hopes to release in future!), and decided that he had to give a career in music at least one try.

Johann then spent a year at a small performing arts school in West London, The Grace Project, learning the crafts of acting, singing, radio and television work, and (somewhat less successfully) dance. In addition, he had the opportunity to study songwriting privately with West End musical songwriter Paul Knight.

Following the completion of his performing arts diploma, Johann decided to pursue his singing further at the highly-regarded Vocal Institute, eventually graduating as the top overall student in the school, and exchanging his prize for a partial scholarship to enrol in the school's Guitar programme (visit the new website for the ICMP).




Projects

At around the time he started his course, he was approached by twin sisters Loretta and Natasha to join them in a new band project, which has evolved into Brownmusic. Performing both as a full band, and as a "stripped down" acoustic trio group, they have been very well received by audiences around London and Milton Keynes, and have also been been invited to perform at several music festivals.

In early 2005, Johann was approached by the management of young singer-songwriter Kirsty Crawford, and has been performing with Kirsty regularly as an acoustic guitar-vocal duo since April. They have also collaborated on co-writing several songs which will hopefully make it onto Kirsty's debut album.

2006 marked the launch of Johann's own band, The Johann Collective. Featuring fresh-sounding, catchy original material, polished writing and incredible musicianship, the Collective are set to make their mark on the London scene in 2007 with the upcoming release of their debut EP and gigs in the new year.




Artistes

Artistes Johann has worked with include Daniel Bedingfield, Andy Abraham and many more (click for a list)...




Venues

The many venues Johann has played include: The Greenbelt Festival (Cheltenham), Hard Rock Cafe (Park Lane, London) and The Cobden Club (London).


To read more about Johann's journey to becoming a musician, in his own words, click here.