Poul Rovsing Olsen (November 4, 1922 – July 2, 1982) was a Danish composer and

ethnomusicologist Ethnomusicology is the multidisciplinary study of music in its cultural context. The discipline investigates social, cognitive, biological, comparative, and other dimensions. Ethnomusicologists study music as a reflection of culture and investiga ...

. Olsen was born in

Copenhagen Copenhagen ( ) is the capital and most populous city of Denmark, with a population of 1.4 million in the Urban area of Copenhagen, urban area. The city is situated on the islands of Zealand and Amager, separated from Malmö, Sweden, by the ...

. He studied with

Knud Jeppesen Knud Jeppesen (15 August 1892 – 14 June 1974) was a Danish musicologist and composer. He was the leading scholar of the composer Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina, about whose life and music he wrote numerous studies. Biography Jeppesen demonstr ...

at the Copenhagen Conservatory (1943-6) and with

Nadia Boulanger Juliette Nadia Boulanger (; 16 September 188722 October 1979) was a French music teacher, conductor and composer. She taught many of the leading composers and musicians of the 20th century, and also performed occasionally as a pianist and organis ...

and

Olivier Messiaen Olivier Eugène Prosper Charles Messiaen (, ; ; 10 December 1908 – 27 April 1992) was a French composer, organist, and ornithology, ornithologist. One of the major composers of the 20th-century classical music, 20th century, he was also an ou ...

in Paris (1948-9), then worked in Copenhagen as a music critic. His early works showed the influences of

Bela Bartók Bela may refer to: Places Asia *Bela Pratapgarh, a town in Pratapgarh District, Uttar Pradesh, India *Bela, a small village near Bhandara, Maharashtra, India *Bela, another name for the biblical city Zoara * Bela, Dang, in Nepal * Bela, Janakpu ...

Igor Stravinsky Igor Fyodorovich Stravinsky ( – 6 April 1971) was a Russian composer and conductor with French citizenship (from 1934) and American citizenship (from 1945). He is widely considered one of the most important and influential 20th-century c ...

and

Carl Nielsen Carl August Nielsen (; 9 June 1865 – 3 October 1931) was a Danish composer, conductor, and violinist, widely recognized as his country's most prominent composer. Brought up by poor yet musically talented parents on the island of Funen, he d ...

, joined in the 1950s by 12-note serialism, but from the 1960s his music began to reflect his work as a musical ethnologist (''A L′inconnu'' for voice and 13 instruments, 1962): he did fieldwork in

Greenland Greenland is an autonomous territory in the Danish Realm, Kingdom of Denmark. It is by far the largest geographically of three constituent parts of the kingdom; the other two are metropolitan Denmark and the Faroe Islands. Citizens of Greenlan ...

and the

Persian Gulf The Persian Gulf, sometimes called the Arabian Gulf, is a Mediterranean seas, mediterranean sea in West Asia. The body of water is an extension of the Arabian Sea and the larger Indian Ocean located between Iran and the Arabian Peninsula.Un ...

and taught at the universities of

Lund Lund (, ;"Lund"
(US) and ) is a city in the provinces of Sweden, province of Scania, southern Swed ...

(1967-9) and Copenhagen (from 1969). His output includes opera, orchestral and chamber music, piano pieces and songs. His opera ''Belisa'' is based on

The Love of Don Perlimplín and Belisa in the Garden ''The'' is a grammatical article in English, denoting nouns that are already or about to be mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The ...

Federico García Lorca Federico del Sagrado Corazón de Jesús García Lorca (5 June 1898 – 19 August 1936) was a Spanish poet, playwright, and theatre director. García Lorca achieved international recognition as an emblematic member of the Generation of '27, a g ...

Compositions

Piano: * Piano Sonata No. 1 (1950) * Piano Sonata No. 2 (1952) Orchestral: * Variations Symphoniques, Op. 27 (1953) * Piano Concerto, Op. 31 (1954) * Sinfonia (1958) * Au fond de la nuit, Op. 61 * Lux coelestis (1978) Operas: *'' Belisa'', premiered at the Royal Opera in Copenhagen in 1966 and recorded by

Dacapo Records Dacapo Records is a Danish classical music and new music record label. It was founded in 1989 to promote the classical and new music of Denmark and represents itself as "the Danish National label" ("Danmarks nationale pladeselskab"). The board inc ...

in 2003. *''Usher'', 1980 *''Collected songs (1941-81) for voice and piano'', edited Ulrik Cold, Christen Stubbe Teglbjærg - 1999 ::''To Lagerkvistsange'' (Two Lagerkvist Songs), Op.15 (1949) ::''Two Prophetic Songs,'' Op.16 (1950) ::''Lyse sange'' (Light Songs), Op.19 (1951) ::''To tyske sange'' (Two German Songs), Op.36 (1955) ::''Smâ sange'' (Little Songs), Op.37 (1941) ::''Tre danske sange'' (3 Danish Songs), Op.39 (1957) ::''Deux Melodies,'' Op.84 (1981)

Ethno-musicology

His major contributions to ethnomusicology included his pioneering work in the music of the Persian Gulf, especially

Bahrain Bahrain, officially the Kingdom of Bahrain, is an island country in West Asia. Situated on the Persian Gulf, it comprises a small archipelago of 50 natural islands and an additional 33 artificial islands, centered on Bahrain Island, which mak ...

. Also his concern with "authors' rights", being a jurist himself, besides the fact that he also was a pianist and a composer. He considered traditional music as a heritage connected though to the persons who performed it therefore always stated the names of performers as he understood that most music of the Middle East was performed with a certain freedom by the performers, and that a good amount of it was created by the performer in what is usually called

improvisation Improvisation, often shortened to improv, is the activity of making or doing something not planned beforehand, using whatever can be found. The origin of the word itself is in the Latin "improvisus", which literally means un-foreseen. Improvis ...

, knowing very well that these improvisations were "moments of impromptus compositions" that gave added-value to the original, traditional work. Olsen (or P.R.O. as his name's initials came to symbolize his name) introduced the names of famous performers from

Arab States of the Persian Gulf The Arab states of the Persian Gulf, also known as the Gulf Arab states (), refers to a group of Arab states bordering the Persian Gulf. There are seven member states of the Arab League in the region: Bahrain, Kuwait, Iraq, Oman, Qatar, Saudi ...

, such as Salem el'Allan, Ahmad Bou Tabanja, Al-'Amiri among others, and Lebanese singer Dunya Yunis, whose tape singing ''Abu Zeluf'' was published on the Tangent 2LP set 'The Human Voice in the World of Islam' which Olsen published with another musicologist Jean Jenkins. (Yunis was sampled in

Brian Eno Brian Peter George Jean-Baptiste de la Salle Eno (, born 15 May 1948), also mononymously known as Eno, is an English musician, songwriter, record producer, visual artist, and activist. He is best known for his pioneering contributions to ambien ...

's My Life in the Bush of Ghosts.) Olsen's invitation of Arab-Luth (`

Oud The oud ( ; , ) is a Middle Eastern short-neck lute-type, pear-shaped, fretless stringed instrument (a chordophone in the Hornbostel–Sachs classification of instruments), usually with 11 strings grouped in six courses, but some models have ...

) player

Munir Bashir Munir Bashir (; ; 1930 – September 28, 1997) was an Iraqi-Assyrian oudist. Bashir is considered one of the foremost virtuosos of the Arabic oud, and is widely renowned as one of the most important figures in 20th century Middle Eastern music. ...

to a music festival in Denmark in the early 1970s, brought this instrumentalist together with an Indian performer where they played duos in a hybrid style. This exquisite and new style brought Bashir into fame all over the Arab world and in many European countries. He also specialised in the traditional

music of Greenland The music of Greenland is a mixture of two primary strands, Inuit and Danish, mixed with influences from the United States and United Kingdom. Greenland's musical character has been described as "definitely a rock country, both musically and lit ...

Publications

* ''An aulos in the Danish National Museum'' 1969 * ''Musiketnologi'' Serie: Berlingske leksikonbibliotek; n.89 1974 * ''Acculturation in the Eskimo songs of the Greenlanders'' 1975 * ''Compte rendu d'un voyage au Moyen-Orient'' 1976 * ''Music and musical instruments in the world of Islam'' Jean L. Jenkins, Poul Rovsing Olsen, Horniman Museum - 1976 * ''Dagbogsblade fra indsamlingsrejse til Angmagssalik'' 1977 * ''Music in Bahrain: traditional music of the Arabian Gulf'' Volume 1 reissued 2002

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Olsen, Poul Rovsing 1922 births 1982 deaths Place of birth missing Danish male composers Danish ethnomusicologists 20th-century Danish composers 20th-century musicologists 20th-century Danish male musicians Burials at Hellerup Cemetery