Press

“From the opening notes on hearing her cello at the Roberto Fonseca gig at the Barbican, to hearing her sing at the World Event Young Artists Festival in Nottingham, to her most recent standout performance at the House of Saint Barnabas this lady is yet more testament of the vast talent emerging from the UK at this time.”

—DJ Gilles Peterson

  • “… a huge talent … like a young Cassandra Wilson would have sounded if she also happened to be a fine cellist.”

    — Jazzwise

  • “Cellist and singer Ayanna Witter-Johnson has to be heard to be believed.
Her self-assured style blends a honey-sweet vocal delivery with bewitching cello-playing.”

    — Time Out

  • “A maverick cellist and vocalist like no other”

    — Louder Than War

Live Reviews

“Aside from the spectacle of masterful musicianship, Witter-Johnson is a highly engaging orator and storyteller. With an amiable warmth, she tells the audience about her childhood, her family life, Jamaican culture, inspirational artistic mentors of hers (including an uncle who sadly passed away during the pandemic), her own eclectic musical upbringing, and how she uses music to empower herself and her listeners, particularly in the face of racial injustice and inequality. The stories she tells are stirring, heart-warming, humorous, poignant, informative, and ultimately very affecting and moving. She even hosts impromptu Q&As with the audience between songs, and skilfully creates some highly dignified audience participation. 

Witter-Johnson’s artistry is one of innovation, quirkiness, sheer joy, and artistic energy. I would very much recommend keeping up to date with her events, and seeing her live if you can!”

— CutCommon (Joseph Asquith) - Purcell Sessions @ Southbank Centre

It might seem a critical cop-out to describe the music of Ayanna Witter-Johnson as “uncategorisable” but it is really a recommendation – it is hard to imagine any taste not being satisfied.

In this performance with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra with the luxury addition of award-winning jazz pianist Fergus McCreadie in a now rare appearance as a side-man, and the bass player from his trio, David Bowden, also in the ranks, she covered that impressive range, guiding the audience with practised charm.

If the concert’s title seemed a bit of a stretch on paper, she explained it eloquently, and the inclusion of two songs by Glasgow’s Jack Bruce, still best known as the bassist in “supergroup” Cream and a mentor to a younger Witter-Johnson, made the local connection. Her version of the classic Rope Ladder to the Moon, from his Songs for a Tailor album, was compelling.

— The Herald (Keith Bruce - Ayanna’s Hometown Roots @ SWG3, Glasgow

“Ayanna Witter-Johnson is a star, with an airy, jazzy voice, effortlessly counterpointing with her precise, muscular cello. The Solem Quartet are more than up to the challenge of the piece’s jazz inflections and technical effects.”

— The Prickle - Beethoven Bartok Now Series with Solem Quartet

Releases

“Singer-songwriter, pianist and cellist Ayanna Witter-Johnson has developed an increasingly fruitful collaboration with the LSO which has resulted in works such as Where Clouds Meet the Sea, DreamCity and FAIYA! A 12-track live album exploring stories relating to Witter-Johnson’s ancestral heritage, culture and identity, Ocean Floor sees her join forces with the LSO Percussion Ensemble.

A moving tribute to her mother which featured on Witter-Johnson’s 2019 album, Road Runner, the dazzling cello part of ‘Unconditionally’ employs a myriad of techniques including pizzicato, col legno, percussive tapping on the body of the instrument, and beautifully sustained bowed lines. There are gorgeous reimaginings of the Witter-Johnson / Ofei Sakyi tune, ‘Chariot’, and ‘Falling’ (also featured on Road Runner), a song of unrequited love co-written with Alex Webb.

Witter-Johnson’s immensely powerful three-part ‘Ocean Floor Suite’ memorialises two moments of personal and historical significance – the loss of 130 enslaved people who were purposely thrown overboard from a British slave ship in the 18th century, and a tragic event she witnessed in Jamaica when a young man lost his life to the ocean.

The album comes full circle with ‘Forever’ – Witter-Johnson’s first collaboration with the percussion ensemble and a companion piece to ‘Unconditionally’ – which builds to a thrilling climactic point of textural intensification, before stripping back to just cello, voice and percussion at its dramatic close. An unmissable collection of storytelling magic.”

— Jazzwise (Peter Quinn), Ocean Floor - LSO Live

“Nothing Less…a modern soul-pop anthem of self-identity, and one of the best singles we’ve heard in a minute. “Come as you are — nothing less,” the chorus demands, a statement of purpose from an artist whose creative essence and CV are nothing if not extravagantly diverse.”

— Afropunk

Compositions

  • "We got a blast of Caribbean sunshine…full of rhythmic swagger, percussive energy and defiantly upbeat melodies…a tribute to the orchestra’s vital role in championing new music in Scotland, as well as a marvellous antidote to a freezing Glasgow winter’s night.""We got a blast of Caribbean sunshine…full of rhythmic swagger, percussive energy and defiantly upbeat melodies…a tribute to the orchestra’s vital role in championing new music in Scotland, as well as a marvellous antidote to a freezing Glasgow winter’s night."

    — The Times (Martin Shields)

  • "Latin American rhythms pulsed as a carnival procession moved. I could almost see the parade and taste the tropical fruits and the rum. Brass and percussion drove the syncopated rhythms and the momentum, while strings and winds were the onlookers joyously caught up in the explosion of colour, rhythm and movement…A thrilling, upbeat, life-affirming concert opener captured the hearts of the Glasgow audience."

    — Edinburgh Music Review (Donal Hurley

  • “Superb music by Ayanna Witter-Johnson sets the scene and helps move the plot along, with evocative African drums and singers lending a mix of dream-like and formidable tones to proceedings.”

    — Broadway World, My Father’s Fables (Bush Theatre)

Radio Show

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