James Poulsen

 jpoulsenweb

James (Jamie) Poulsen has been a freelance composer in Des Moines for 20 years. Heartland Poem is Mr. Poulsen's third commissioned orchestral work premiered by Maestro Giunta and The Des Moines Symphony.  His Five Poems of Edgar Allan Poe for tenor and orchestra was premiered in 1999. Poulsen's Piano Concerto was premiered in February of 2002.  The pianist was Joseph Kalichstein, the chamber music director for Lincoln Center in New York City.

He has composed music for hundreds of local and regional commercials and corporate videos for companies such as The Walt Disney Company, Wellmark, Pioneer, Maytag, Farm Bureau, The Principal, Prairie Meadows, Mercy and Methodist Hospitals, The Des Moines Register, Medicap Pharmacies, and Hy-Vee Food Stores. From 1994-2001 he wrote,  produced, and arranged music tracks for conventions  throughout the country for Disney Event Productions in Orlando for such clients as Butler Manufacturing, Williams Communications, INACOM Computers, EMC/Mass., Liz Claiborne, Beneficial Finance, Lucent Technologies, and The California Board of Tourism.  Poulsen has scored a full-length independent horror film entitled "Devoured", which was shown at the 2005 Cannes Film Festival. In 2007, he composed a track for the Iowa Tax Amnesty commercials for the Integer Group.

 Mr. Poulsen teaches music theory, ear training, and piano at Simpson College in Indianola, Iowa. He studied composition with Stephen Yarbrough at The University of South Dakota plus Richard Hervig and world re-known avant-garde composer Kenneth Gaburo at the University of Iowa.  Poulsen has solo vocal and choral works published by Kenwood Press in Minneapolis.

Poulsen's recent compositions include a work for men's chorus entitled ‘Men', based on a poem by Archibald MacLeish. The piece was performed by the men of Phi Mu Alpha at a concert honoring the 90th anniversary of the Pi Chapter at Simpson College. He has also composed more vocal works based on letters of Edgar Allan Poe and poetry of Jane Austen.

Poulsen has won 11 national Telly awards and 21 Iowa Addy awards for music in advertising, including Best Instrumental Music for a Commercial in 2002.  He won first prize in the 1985 Presbyterian Metro Ministries of Omaha Sacred Composition Contest with his choral work, ‘Alleluia, Gloria', which was performed by the Simpson Choir in 2002.  He has won ‘Best Score' at the Iowa Motion Picture Awards four times, most recently in 2005 for his score for ‘The Iowa Experience', which is shown continuously at the Iowa Hall of Pride in Des Moines. James Poulsen is a member of ASCAP.