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The German violist Johannes Erkes studied at the Munich Conservatory with Oscar Lysy. Subsequent studies with Kim Kashkashian complemented his musical training. As soloist and chamber musician Erkes is equally in demand and gave appearances in all the great concert halls in Europe, South-America and Japan. He performed concertos with orchestras such as the Orfeo Orchestra Budapest, the Salzburger kammerphilharmonie, the Orchestra da Camera di Padova e del Veneto, the Klassichen Philharmonie Bonn and the Staatsorchester Braunschweig. He was invited at numerous international chamber music festivals such as the Helsinki Festival, the Kuhmo Chamber Music Festival (Finland), the Bath festival (UK), the Oleg Kagan Musikfest in Kreuth (Germany), the Rossini Festival in Pesaro (Italy), the festival ‚Begegnungen’ (Salzburg) and the Festival of Besançon (France). His musical partners among others were Valery Affanassiev, Gordan Nikolic, Michel Dalberto, Natalia Gutman, Alexander Lonquich, Karl Leister, Charles Neidich, Alexander Janiczek and Wolfgang Schulz. Erkes is a regular guest leader in the Camerata Academia Salzburg. Furthermore he is a member of the Cristofori Piano Quartet Amsterdam with whom he recently recorded the Beethoven en Schumann piano quartets.

Erkes made numerous radio broadcasts and compact disc recordings for the WDR, the BBC, RAI and the labels BIS and festivo records. In 1993 he founded the chamber music festival Festivo in Aschau im Chiemgau (Germany), which under his direction quickly gained an international reputation.

Since 2005 he is music director of the german foundation 'Internationale Stiftung zur Foerderung von Kultur und Zivilisation' in munich,founded by Erich Fischer. Further more he was artisric director of Toujours Mozart festival in Salzburg and Vienna.

In november 2004 he was awarded the Kulturpreis des Landkreises Rosenheim (Germany).

Johannes Erkes plays a Viola of Giuseppe Guadagnini from the year 1798.