Blake Johnson, DMA

Dr. Blake Johnson is the oboe instructor at Campbellsville University where he teaches oboe lessons, studio and reed class as well as courses in music history and music appreciation. Johnson’s research and performance interests center around the musical activities of oboists in eighteenth-century London. His research investigates the ways in which foreign oboists influenced the musical life of London through the styles, instruments, and compositions they brought with them; collaborations between performers and composers, particularly in the oboe writing of George Frideric Handel; and the development of the oboe and technical ability throughout the eighteenth century. Dr. Johnson’s research on the oboe in London during the second half of the eighteenth century, centered around oboists Thomas Vincent and Johann Christian Fischer, has been published in Early Music and The Double Reed. His research on collaborations between Handel and his oboists and the development of Handel’s obbligato writing, which formed the bulk of his MM thesis, was supported by the American Handel Society’s 2022 J. Merrill Knapp Research Fellowship. This research was presented at the American Handel Society’s 2023 conference and published in Early Music Performance and Research. Johnson is Principal Oboist of the Sacred Winds Ensemble, previously performed as a member of the Cave Run Symphony Orchestra, and has appeared as a guest oboist with the Orquesta Sinfónica de Guayaquil in Ecuador and the Midwest Chamber Ensemble. He has performed at conferences of the American Choral Directors Association, Kentucky Music Educators Association, and the North American Saxophone Alliance. An active teacher, Dr. Johnson has maintained a private studio of students of all age levels and his students have consistently placed in honor ensembles including both Kansas All State Band and Orchestra. He has presented masterclasses at The University of Virginia’s College at Wise, Morehead State University, the Centro Ecuatoriano Norteamericano and Universidad de las Artes in Guayaquil, Ecuador, and has been an active clinician throughout Kentucky, Kansas, and Missouri. Dr. Johnson holds a Doctor of Musical Arts in Performance and a Master of Music in both Performance and Musicology from the University of Missouri – Kansas City Conservatory and a Bachelor of Music in Performance from Morehead State University. His primary teachers are Celeste Johnson, Thomas Pappas, Mary Lindsey Bailey, and John Viton.