Poul Rovsing Olsen

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

Olsen was born in Copenhagen. He studied with Knud Jeppesen at the Copenhagen Conservatory (1943-6) and with Nadia Boulanger and Olivier Messiaen in Paris (1948-9), then worked in Copenhagen as a music critic. His early works showed the influences of Bela Bartók, Igor Stravinsky and Carl Nielsen, 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 and the Persian Gulf and taught at the universities of Lund (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 by Federico García Lorca.

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