 Johnson moved to New York City in 1937 and began to work with NBC's Radio City Music Hall and Lyn Murray and the Columbia Symphony Orchestra at CBS, sometimes touring in concerts in North America.She studied voice and operatic repertoire in New York with Ernst Knoth and Sidney Dietch.In 1941, she sang Dorabella in "Così fan tutte", opening the Tanglewood opera house at Lenox, Massachusetts.