Accolades
for Peach (2012) & Star and Season (2008) album releases
Johns’ strong voice and distinctive inflections are reminiscent of the vocalists of the 1940s who made their debut at such jazz staples as Café Society in New York and Storyville in Boston.
Susan Frances
Yahoo!
Karen Johns is a winner. She possesses classic looks and a voice to match. PEACH, her new album of jazz vocals backed by her sizzling big band, is definitely in its own class. Johns has an electrifying harmonic range that lifts and transports a listener to the dizzying heights of any jazz era… She sings with ‘joie de vivre’- a singular originality that separates her from every other vocalist in her genre.
C.J. Bond
Jazz Music
Sometimes she’s so perky and playful, bouncy and breezy, that you can’t imagine a cloud in her pink sky. Then, another track brings a gentle melancholy. Versatile-voiced Karen Johns skips along through a baker’s dozen of songs on her eclectic CD—her eighth—called Peach.
Rob Lester
Talking Broadway
Karen’s songs show originality and a point of view with both wit and heart. They are literate, and it’s clear she is an absolutely genuine songwriting talent.
Alan Bargebuhr
Cadence Magazine
The lady has authoritative range with her vocals… Ms. Johns’ execution of arrangements can be compared to notes vying for her affection with the result actually being the affection becoming ours.
Karl Stober
Jazzreview
As the Duke used to say, ‘It don’t mean a thing, if it ain’t got that swing.’ Ms. Johns and her band have that… in spades!… But Ms. Johns blows me away. Not just with her range and styling, both of which are enough to make her stand out in a crowd. But the music itself is the very best of stuff.
Doug Boynton
Girlsingers (UK)
This is way more than just high talent, this kind of vocalist only comes along once in a blue moon.
Rotcod Zzaj
Improvijazzation Nation
Karen Johns & Company have created music that has staying power. The entire work has purpose and meaning, and it invites us on a journey that’s worth taking at any season.
Butler Cain, Ph.D.
News Director NPR-APR, Tuscaloosa, Alabama
Vocalist and composer Karen Johns combines her ability to swoon the listener with sultry, jazz vocals and swinging original compositions that further highlight her abilities to create a stellar offering of her own jazz standards that stand on their own next to classic and timeless American Songbook selections.
Petro Cabognani
Vinilemania, Bibbiano, Italy
Johns knows her way around a song and delivers the goods hot!
Chris Spector
Editor and Publisher, Midwest Record
I really love the CDs from Karen, that’s why she is on the top of my playlist and will be heard regularly on my program.
Joost van Steen
Host/Poducer, ASFM Radio 105.4, the Netherlands
Nashville’s smoothest vocals!
The Nashville City Paper
The songs Karen Johns writes are so poetic and narrative, it appears that she has added a few more pages to the book of jazz standards.
Ginny Kennedy, NPR/APR
Jazz may have once been the ‘poor man’s’ music, but when it comes to the music of Karen Johns, the jazz is rich and all woman.
Williamson Herald
Johns writes songs that mirror original jazz legends like Ella Fitzgerald and Louie Armstrong
The Tennessean, Williamson A.M.
I am thoroughly enjoying the Karen Johns & Company CD!
Pierre-Jean, Galaxie Jazz, Canada
Karen Johns & Company can SWING
Redford Manning, Jazz Media Magazine
I was impressed by her soulfulness on the album…
Jake Obstfeld, WMHB FM
It’s a great album!
Bill Bruce, KFSR FM