Playing Since: 1970
Experience Level: Expert/Professional

Occupation: musician, singer/songwriter, teacher, instrument sales and service, piano tuning

Gender: Male
Age: 70

My Instruments:
guitar and banjo

Favorite Bands/Musicians:
New Grass Revival, Monroe, Stanley, Cadillac Sky, Sparks, Strings, and White

Classified Rating: not rated
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Profile Info:
Visible to: Public
Created 9/26/2018
Last Visit 12/1/2025

I was a big Beatles and Dylan fan. I heard the Sweethearts of the Rodeo album by the Byrds, and heard my first banjo on that LP. I bought a Harmony 5 string banjo and started buying any album that had a banjo on the cover. That was my introduction to Bluegrass. Soon, along with brother Bruce and friends Randy Reynolds and Tim Moody we started a high school bluegrass band "Luke Warm and the Bluegrass Cheeseburgers". Then came the Circle album, Dueling Banjos on the radio and Hartford's Steam Powered Aereo Plane. There was no turning back. I grew up in Indianapolis. We heard there was a bluegrass festival in Bean Blossom Indiana just 60 miles away. It was there I heard all the first generation greats, Monroe, Stanley, Martin, Osbornes, etc. and tent camping next to Bill Keith, the New Grass boys, Peter Rowan out field picking, Kenny Baker shaking our tent to wake us up and check our tickets. It was Bluegrass Heaven. My senior year of high school, our family moved north to Winona Lake Indiana. I was still just a newbie to the Bluegrass world but I found myself in the good company of local Bluegrass greats, The Moore Brothers, Clyde Bowling, Kenny DeMarcus, John Cole, Jim Cornel, Tony DeMarco, and Jack Chaffins. I was soon off to college in Greenville Illinois where my brother and I resurrected the Cheeseburgers with new found pickers and friends Bruce Swamp Weiss, Melody Sharpe, Jim Hoiles, Lyle Mayfield,and Frank Kline. I fell in love, married Melody and moved back to Winona Lake. Soon brother Bruce was back in the area also. At this time we put together our band “The Johnsons”. We started playing festivals in northern Indiana. It was here we met and added Jeff White to the band. We were playing a festival or a club every weekend while we all still worked our day jobs or school. Bruce and wife Ann had their first child, Dylan. Between work, school, music on the weekends, and now caring for a baby it was all too much so Bruce left the band, and we invited in my old high school friend Tim Moody. Tim (RIP) was in grad school at Purdue and our busy gigging schedule proved to be too much so after a year he said goodbye. During this time, I was also working and teaching at a music store in Wabash Indiana, The Bandstand. The store and owner Bill Hayes had a weekly Friday night jam. It became a huge draw and pickers from all over were coming to join in. It was here we first met Don Anderson, a wonderful mandolin picker from Mooresville Indiana. When Tim left the band we invited Don in. Playing every weekend we got good. “The Johnsons” were now Jeff White guitar, Don Anderson mandolin, Melody Johnson bass, and me David Johnson banjo. In 1981 we won the KFC Best New Bluegrass Band competition in Louisville Kentucky. Melody and I moved to Nashville that same year. Leaving the band behind we were ready to start our family. Soon came twin boys, Lee and Evan, and daughter Ketley. In Nashville we put together our band, “Forward Roll”, with friends Elkin Brown on guitar, Rob Haines and Andy Shivis on mandolin. We played The Station Inn and Wind in the Willows pretty regular but like Bruce, work, music, and kids were just too much, so we took a long break from the band thing. We did some writing and writers nights for our musical outlet. Years later we formed “Hickory Wind” with Larry Carney and Kathy Kuhn. Most recently we've been playing old time with “The Tennessee Wildflowers”, our son Evan on fiddle, T-Claw banjo and calling, Cornilia Overton 2nd fiddle, Melody and me on bass and guitar. We are still in Nashville playing the occasional gig. I just retired from teaching banjo. I've been teaching in music stores since high school, 53 years. I decided to post many of my banjo tabs and arrangements here on Banjo Hangout. Under profile they left a field for BIO, so here it is ... Keep Pickin'.