Mary Grace Johnson, from Murfreesboro, Tennessee, is a Cornelius Vanderbilt scholarship recipient at Vanderbilt’s Blair School of Music, where she studies with Cornelia Heard. Before beginning her collegiate studies at Vanderbilt, Mary Grace was involved in the pre-college program at Blair as a Myra Jackson Scholar and studied with Christian Teal, first violinist emeritus of the Blair String Quartet. She has won numerous competitions and awards, including the MTNA Southern Division and State Young Artist Solo Competitions, Nashville Symphony Curb concerto competition, Vanderbilt concerto competition, Curb Youth Symphony concerto competition, Thor Johnson Scholarship competition, the Martha McCrory Award, and the Jean Keller Heard Prize for Excellence in String Performance. In 2016 she was inducted into Pi Kappa Lambda, the National Music Honor Society. Mary Grace has attended many summer festivals including the Aspen Music Festival, two summers as concertmaster of the Eastern Music Festival, and two consecutive summers as principle second and assistant concertmaster at Colorado College Summer Music Festival. In addition to her leadership roles at these festivals, she has also served as concertmaster of the Vanderbilt University Orchestra and the Curb Youth Symphony. Mary Grace was selected to represent the Blair School in London as part of an exchange program at the Royal Academy of Music in March of 2016, and was the chosen performer at Vanderbilt’s 2016 commencement, where she premiered a commissioned work by composer Jack Coen. She is an active freelance musician and regularly subs with the Nashville Symphony and Gateway Chamber Orchestra, in addition to her work in Nashville recording studios. Mary Grace has had the honor of working with and playing for several leading musicians including Glenn Dicterow, Augustin Hadelich, Ani Kavafian, Robert McDuffie, Almita and Roland Vamos, Elisabeth Adkins and many others. In addition to her violin studies, Mary Grace is pursuing minors in viola and baroque violin and is second violinist of the Aurelius String Quartet.
