Gunnar Johansen

Gunnar Johansen, Danish born pianist and composer (1906 – 1991). He studied in his native Denmark with the pianist and conductor Victor Schiöler, then in Berlin with Egon Petri, the disciple of Ferruccio Busoni. He came to the United States in 1929 first settling in California, and later teaching for many years as artist-in-residence at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Johansen was the first artist in residence as a musician at any university in the US. A romantic piano virtuoso of the highest order, he was one of the chief proponents of the music of Busoni, whose works he recorded in their entirety, as well as the complete keyboard works of Bach and Liszt. [ [http://www.wiscomposers.org/news/1998_02/feature.html http://www.wiscomposers.org/news/1998_02/feature.html] ] As a composer he was also prolific with nearly 750 compositions in various forms: 31 piano sonatas, three piano concertos, three violin sonatas, a large 1937 work for orchestra (Variations, Disguises, and Fugue, on a Merry Theme of Cyrus McCormick, along with works for string quartet, oboe, and vocal ensembles. An interesting turn in his career came in 1953 when he read in The Notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci: "Music has two ills, the one mortal, the other wasting. The mortal is ever allied with the instant which follows that of the music’s utterance, the wasting lies in its repetition, making it seem contemptible and mean." With that questionable statement in mind, Johansen recorded his first Improvised Sonata. This process continued until 1990 with the completion of 550 such works.

Johansen’s many humanitarian efforts included establishment of the Leonardo Academy dedicated to the integration of the arts and sciences. He organized conferences which included such notables as Edward Teller, inventor of the American hydrogen bomb, and Buckminster Fuller, inventor of the geodesic dome.

References