One of the most outstanding instrumentalists in rock over the past 40 years, Texas guitarist Eric Johnson was already a legend before he recorded his first album. Comparisons were made to such guitar heroes as Jeff Beck and Jimi Hendrix. With the release of his highly-anticipated 1986 solo debut album Tones, the underground guitar legend finally emerged onto the scene. It landed him on the cover of Guitar Player magazine, which hailed the album as a “majestic debut” and earned him his first Grammy nomination for the song “Zap”. With the release of his follow up album, 1990’s platinum-selling Ah Via Musicom, which contained the Grammy Award winning song “Cliffs of Dover”, Eric Johnson became a bona fide international guitar phenomenon. The New Age Music Guide once opined that “Eric Johnson plays guitar the way Michelangelo painted ceilings: with a colorful vibrancy that’s more real than life” while Rolling Stone included him in their list of the 100 Greatest Guitarists of the 21st century. Eric has received eight Grammy nominations along with numerous other recognitions, awards and wins in various polls and magazines. Among Johnson’s many accolades are a GRAMMY award in 1992 for “Cliffs of Dover” as Best Rock Instrumental Performance, lifetime induction into the Guitar Player Gallery of Greats, and his listing among the “100 Greatest Guitarists of the 20th Century” by Musician magazine. In his hometown of Austin Texas, a city full of guitarists, the readers of the Austin Chronicle voted Eric Johnson the city’s “Best Electric Guitarist” and “Best Acoustic Guitarist”
in their yearly poll year after year. They also named him “Electric Guitarist of the Decade” and one of the top five “Musicians of the Decade”. In February 2024 Eric was honored with induction into the Texas Heritage Songwriters Association Hall of Fame.
Over the course of more than four decades, Eric Johnson has been traveling on a prolific odyssey. Along the way, his creations have cross-pollinated the various musical genres which include rock, blues, jazz, fusion, soul, folk,new-age, classical, and even country.
