Biography
Biography
Guy Johnston is a renowned British cellist, celebrated for his exceptional skill and artistry. His early successes included winning the BBC Young Musician of the Year, and significant awards, notably the Shell London Symphony Orchestra Gerald MacDonald Award, Suggia Gift Award and a Young British Classical Performer Brit Award.
He has performed with many leading international orchestras including the London Philharmonic, Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, NHK Symphony Orchestra, BBC Symphony, Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin, Orquestra Sinfônica do Estado de São Paulo, and St Petersburg Symphony. Recent seasons have included a BBC Prom with BBC National Orchestra of Wales, concertos with The Hallé, Philharmonia Orchestra, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Orchestra of Opera North, BBC Symphony Orchestra, Aurora Orchestra, Royal Northern Sinfonia, and Orchestra of The Swan. Most recently, he has been the featured soloist of Taverner’s ‘The Protecting Veil’ for Britten Sinfonia’s 2024 UK and Ireland tour receiving critical acclaim in The Guardian and the Arts Desk. Guy was also involved in four further performances of ‘The Protecting Veil’ with Britten Sinfonia in October 2025; at Hatfield House Music Festival, Cambridge Music Festival, and two performances at St Sophia’s Orthodox Church in London which will be recorded with Signum records.
Performances and recordings with eminent conductors have included collaborations with Alexander Dmitriev, Andrew Manze, Sir Andrew Davis, Daniele Gatti, Ilan Volkov, Leonard Slatkin, Mark Wigglesworth, Robin Ticciati, Sir Roger Norrington, Sakari Oramo, Vassily Sinaisky, Yan Pascal Tortelier and Yuri Simonov.
Guy is a passionate advocate for chamber music and recitals as founding Artistic Director of the Hatfield House Music Festival, Music at Minterne, and performs regularly at prestigious venues and festivals across Europe including Wigmore Hall, Louvre Museum, the Moscow Tchaikovsky Conservatory, and Three Choirs Festival, collaborating with instrumentalists such as Anthony Marwood, Brett Dean, Huw Watkins, Janine Jansen, Kathy Stott, Lawrence Power, Melvyn Tan, Mishka Rushdie Momen, Sheku Kanneh-Mason and Tom Poster.
A prolific recording artist often championing contemporary British composers, Guy’s recent releases include Dobrinka Tabakova’s Cello Concerto with The Hallé and Rebecca Dale’s ‘Night Seasons’ with the Philharmonia Orchestra. Other recordings include a premiere of Herbert Howells’ completed Cello Concerto with the Britten Sinfonia, a celebration disc of the tricentenary of his David Tecchler cello with commissions by Charlotte Bray, David Matthews, Mark Simpson and a collaboration with the acclaimed Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome, where the cello was made. In July 2025, Guy’s recent recording of the Bliss Cello Concerto with the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra was released, coinciding with Bliss’ 50th anniversary year. Future releases also include Guy’s latest recording of Xiaogang Ye’s My Faraway Nanjing with the RLPO.
He gave the premiere of Charlotte Bray’s ‘Falling in the Fire’ at the BBC Proms and Joseph Phibbs ‘Cello Sonata’ at Wigmore Hall and most recently, gave the World Premiere of Donnacha Dennehy’s ‘Woven’, a duo for Cello and Marimba, commissioned by Westport Festival in September 2025. Other premières include two works by Matthew Kaner: Sonatina Scordatura for solo cello, a world premiere at Hatfield House Music Festival in October 2025, and a new Sonata set to premiere at Wigmore Hall in May 2026. 2026 will also see the world premiere of Joseph Phibbs’ Cello Concerto for Guy and the BBC Symphony Orchestra.
In addition to a busy and versatile career as an international soloist, chamber musician and guest principal, Guy is an inspiring leader of young musicians. He was an Associate Professor of Cello at the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, New York (2018 – 2024). He is the President of the European String Teachers Association and a Professor of Cello at the Royal Academy of Music from September 2025. Guy is patron of several charities which promote music education for school children and young people including Music First and Future Talent. He is also a board member of the Pierre Fournier Award for young cellists.
Guy Johnston plays the 1692 Antonio Stradivari cello known as the “Segelman, ex Hart” kindly loaned to him through the Beare’s International Violin Society by a generous patron. He is a Larsen Strings Artist.
Charity
Guy supports a number of charities and has performed fundraising concerts for The Brain Injury Rehabilitation Trust, Dogs for the Disabled, CLIC Sargent and Macmillan Cancer charities. Read More
Charity
Guy supports a number of charities and has performed fundraising concerts for The Brain Injury Rehabilitation Trust, Dogs for the Disabled, CLIC Sargent and Macmillan Cancer charities.
In addition, Guy is extremely honoured to be a Patron and Trustee of:
- Pierre Fournier Award
- Future Talent
- Music First/National Orchestra for All
- Kampala Music School
- Niemann Pick Disease Group UK
Future Talent gives financial awards and guidance to young musicians who are clearly demonstrating outstanding musical ability or potential, but do not have the financial means to reach their goal.
Guy first became involved with the Charity after meeting the Duchess of Kent, Founder and Trustee of the Charity, in 2000. He was particularly touched that the Charity allowed children, who would not otherwise have the opportunity to pursue musical dreams, to experience music and express themselves in music for the first time.
Since then, Guy has performed a number of concerts to raise money and the profile of the Charity. More information can be found at www.futuretalent.org
The NPDG (UK) was established over 20 years ago to help provide support and information to families caring for those with Nieman-Pick Disease. The charity also aims to raise awareness of the disease and promote research into the cause and possible treatments. The Group has to date raised over £1,000,000 for this cause.
This rare disease causes brain degeneration, learning difficulties, problems with muscle co-ordination and severe feeding, swallowing and speaking difficulties. Guy became aware of the disease and charity when, in 2000, he met Tony Jellings (Head of Fund Raising), whose daughter very sadly suffers from the disease. Brain injury and degeneration issues are important to Guy. When Guy was 16, his eldest brother Rupert was involved in a car accident leaving him brain damaged and cutting short his promising career as a French Horn player.
Guy performs a concert annually to raise money for the NPDG (UK), and more information on this charity can be found at www.niemannpick.org.uk
Hatfield House
Chamber Music
Festival
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Hatfield House Music Festival
About the Festival
President: The Marquess of Salisbury
Patron: HRH The Duchess of Kent
Artistic Director: Guy Johnston
The Hatfield House Music Festival is a long weekend of concerts, curated by Artistic Director Guy Johnston, which takes place annually in September/October at Hatfield House in Hertfordshire. The setting, musicians and audiences make this a warm, friendly festival with exceptionally high artistic standards. Now approaching its 13th year, the Festival has grown into a very successful and much-anticipated event by both locals and also by those who make a special journey to attend the Festival.
Over the past 12 years the Festival has welcomed performers such as the Navarra Quartet, pianists Tom Poster, Kathryn Stott and Melvyn Tan, Nicholas Daniel oboe, Alison Balsom trumpet, Sheku Kanneh-Mason cello, Lucy Crowe soprano, Rachel Podger baroque violin, James Gilchrist tenor, The Sixteen, the Aurora Orchestra and VOCES8, all to perform in the beautiful surroundings of Hatfield House.
The Festival has a very strong education strand which runs alongside the main event and is committed to commissioning new works. Previous new commissions at the Festival include works by Charlotte Bray Perseus for cello and piano (2015 and at least 3 subsequent performances), Mark Simpson (Oboe Quartet 2019, co-commissioned by Wigmore Hall and Leicester International Music Festival) In 2017 HHCMF dedicated the whole Festival theme of Creation to works by contemporary composers Sally Beamish, Alec Roth, Thomas Adès, Joseph Phibbs, Donald Grant and others. In 2021 as part of our 10th anniversary celebrations the Festival commissioned two pieces, one for cello and piano by Joseph Phibbs and one solo cello piece by Matthew Kaner.
For full programme information see: https://hatfieldhousemusicfestival.org.uk/2024-festival/programme/
Guy Johnston
Projects
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2025Cremona
Following previous trips to Rome and Venice in search of birthplaces of the great cellos, Guy recently went to Cremona from the 11th-13th April, completing the Italian trilogy with his 1692 Stradivarius Cello.
Read MorePress
News & Reviews
Review: Guy Johnston with the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra
Photo credit: Gareth Jones
"The conclusion was energetic, Johnston using the opportunity to demonstrate his virtuosity in all registers of his instrument."
Read the full review from Bachtrack here
Reviews: Guy Johnston in Phibbs Cello Concerto Premiere
Photo credit: Mark Allan
THOROUGHLY GOOD
"The applause came quickly, and was confident, resolute and enthusiastic."
Read the full article here
THE GUARDIAN
"Johnston’s solo line, pensive and unshowy throughout, was neatly framed thanks to Clemens Schuldt’s mindful control over his BBC Symphony Orchestra forces."
Read the full article here
PLAYS TO SEE
"Joseph Phibbs’ Cello Concerto was the event of the evening, composed for soloist Guy Johnston, and providing plenty of opportunity for him to display his characteristic combination of effortless virtuosity and carefully calibrated emotional expression."
Read the full article here
Blog
Jane Cowan Remembered, Royal Academy of Music 26/2/17
Jane Cowan Remembered, Royal Academy of Music 26/2/17
I’ve come to know Jane through the stories I’ve heard. My Uncle use to go to the cello centre here in London and I was fortunate enough to study with a number of her students including Nicholas Jones, who is sorry not to be here today, Steven Doane, David Waterman and Steven Isserlis. All of them are sitting on my shoulders here at the Academy where I have the honour of teaching a vibrant class of cellists – Joel was playing in the ensemble just now – and I like to think that Jane’s influence continues to live on from the wisdom I have picked up along the way through these extraordinary people. If they are anything to go by, Jane clearly must have been a one off! I was having dinner with Steve and David the other night and we were considering the order of events for today. The stories of Jane were out in all their glory – Steve talks of Jane as a kind of saviour to him during a crossroads in his latter student years and David remembers one of his first experiences in Scotland when Jane apparently shrieked, “Fake!” and “Boring!” at him. If anything sounded unnatural, there were consequences! But these stories, and there are many more that we can look forward to hearing in a moment, also helped me to make sense of some experiences during Steven’s classes at IMS Prussia Cove. As a young aspiring cellist keen to make an impression on my childhood idol, I would often take criticism deeply personally particularly in front of peers who would be watching. “Why do you do that?” “What does it say in the score?” “Vibrato should not be automatic!” “Relax!” and one of the biggest insults of all, and similar to Jane’s outbursts, “Cellist!” In fact, it was not necessarily an attack on me, but rather more about a desire to serve the music first. It was about getting beyond ones instrument in search of the essence of the music and not just about playing the cello. All of these formative experiences studying with Jane’s protégés makes me realise what an impact she had on all their lives and that her influence continues to shine through them and all those for whom her passion, uniqueness and, dare I say it, eccentricities have rubbed off on. Steve, today is an inspired idea and as always the London Cello Society and the Royal Academy have been so enthusiastic in their willingness to make such an event happen. Bringing everyone together in this way to reminisce and share these moments with all of us makes it a particularly special occasion, and so without further ado I’d like to invite our panel of past students to the stage to share their memories of Jane with us.
Contact
Ikon Arts Management
Nicola Semple
Unit 12 The Stableyard
Broomgrove Road
London
SW9 9TL
Nicky Thomas Media consultancy
Nicky Thomas
Unit 12 The Stableyard
Broomgrove Road
London
SW9 9TL