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Sven-Åke Johansson (born 1943 in Mariestad) is a Swedish composer, drummer, poet, author and visual artist associated with European free jazz and free improvisation, who has lived in Berlin since 1968.

Johansson is one of the first European free jazz drummers:^[1] he was part of the Peter Brötzmann trio that recorded For Adolphe Sax (1967) and Machine Gun (1968), alongside bassist Peter Kowald.^[2] Johansson briefly joined an early incarnation of Tangerine Dream in 1968,^[3] played in the Globe Unity Orchestra and with German reedist Alfred Harth and Belgian pianist Nicole Van den Plas in E.M.T.^[4]^[5] In 1972, he recorded and released Schlingerland, one of the first solo free jazz recordings by a drummer.^[6] Johansson formed a long-running duo with pianist Alexander von Schlippenbach in 1976.^[6]

Johansson has contributed to numerous exhibitions, publications and hundreds of recordings.^[4] He has also produced radio plays for several German radio stations. He has played with Hans Reichel, Jeanne Lee, Gunter Hampel, Michel Waisvisz, Axel Dörner, Albert Oehlen, Rhodri Davis, Ken Vandermark, Otomo Yoshihide, Rüdiger Carl, Andrea Neumann, and many others.

Since 2010, he has been working in collaboration with German vocalist and composer Oliver Augst. The duo has created a concert program called Eisler im Sitzen, as well as various radio plays, such as In St. Wendel am Schloßplatz, which was broadcast on Deutschlandfunk in 2017 and presented live at various locations. Johansson has been also collaborating with electronic musician Jan Jelinek (on modular synthesizer) since at least 2017.