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James DeMars has written numerous works that frequently explore intercultural collaborations:

Two World Concerto, for Native American flutist, R. Carlos Nakai

  "...on epic scale, sweepingly dramatic & rhythmically concise." L.A. Times

Native Drumming, for the Black Lodge Pow-wow Singers & Orchestra

  "...searingly honest, by turns mesmerizing, haunting, hair-raising and astonishing... just plain gorgeous in its sonics, with strings racing over the singer-drummers like a veil of night  over the desert, and brass harmonies moving like sunlight across a mesa."   Arizona Republic

Sabar, Concerto for African Drums & Orchestra for Mark Sunkett

 "DeMars brings the orchestra into direct union with ritual music and dance from Senegal in a sonic travelogue, that was stunningly entertaining as well as culturally engaging." Arizona Republic

An American Requiem (75') for chorus, soloist & orchestra: "At the close of last night's national premiere performance (Kennedy Center, 1995, with Mormon Tabernacle Choir) there could have been little doubt that James DeMars had met the standards of the death masses of Brahms and Britten; grand and spacious, stately, ethereal, glorious, inspired and quintessentially American, (it) speaks of untarnished dreams and naive yearnings; an intensely hopeful conjuration of all that is best about the nation's peoples."  Washington Post

Violin Concerto (for Boro Martinic-Jercic and Phoenix Symphony) 

 "...strongly profiled, sumptuously scored, contoured lyricism and a vivacious sense of rhythm." Arizona Republic

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Bio:  James DeMars (b.1952) belongs to a generation of composers that has rediscovered the range, depth and stylistic variety of tonal writing. His music is neither neo-Romantic, nor Minimal, nor in any way dependent on pastiche. It leads the ear from note to note, phrase to phrase, with freshness and vitality. Sometimes a DeMars score will draw on non-Western sources or forms and at other times, he explores the path laid down by mainstream Western art music in the 20th century.

In 1994 DeMars conducted the premiere of An American Requiem with the Phoenix Symphony and in 1995 he conducted the Mormon Tabernacle Choir in the nationally televised (PBS) performances at the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC, at New York's Cathedral of St. John the Divine, and a subsequent performance with the Utah Symphony. In 1997 he conducted the European premiere at Ãglise La Trinity in Paris with members of the Orchestre de Paris and was honored with induction to the French Order of Arts and Letters.

Ensembles that have performed his music include the Minnesota Orchestra, the California Symphony, the Chicago Sinfonietta, the Anchorage Symphony, The Tucson Symphony, the Wuppertal (Germany) Symphony, Saskatchewan Symphony, the New York Choral Society, and Choer et Orchestre Francais D'Oratorio. The NEA, the Heard Museum, Flynn Foundation, Art Renaissance Foundation, European-American Foundation and others have provided commissions leading to publication of music now appearing on more than 20 CDs of various labels.

A review of his second recording for Canyon Records with R. Carlos Nakai, entitled Native Tapestry, states; "DeMars is an eclectic composer, and a thoroughly capable one- he is able to control the wide variety of materials and styles he draws upon, and avoid making them sound like a pastiche. He may remind one of Henry Cowell or Alan Hovhaness. The interweaving melodies, irregular meters- are they Persian, Chinese, or Balkan or something else entirely?  " ... the music develops contrasting episodes in a fluid convincing manner. a chromatic lyricism to express the European presence among the wistful Native flute and African percussion or intertwining melodies above a rhythmic ostinato alternating between eleven and eight beats (a sort of cross between a bolero and Arabic taksim), everything flows comfortably.  ... the contrasting styles coexist in both languorous and bubbly counterpoint. I found it sincere, well crafted and pleasant".   Fanfare Magazine

His third recording for Canyon Records with R. Carlos Nakai, entitled Two World Concerto, was a winner in two categories of the 1998 Annual Native American Music Awards. DeMars earned his doctorate at the University of Minnesota following studies with Dominick Argento and Eric Stokes. He currently teaches composition at Arizona State University in Tempe.

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additional information:  DeMars grew up in the small, northern town of Battle Lake, Minnesota. As a child, he studied piano and began to compose. He recalls titling an early piece Mexican Holiday, "because it seemed like a much better place to be." From the start, exotic locales and literary references showed up in the DeMars canon. At 18, he moved to St. Paul, where DeMars studied with pianist/composer Donald Betts at Macalester College. After graduating summa cum laude, he left for Los Angeles with the intent of doing graduate work in conducting at the University of Southern California. He explains: "I had no belief whatsoever that you could earn a living as a composer, so I studied conducting."

Fortunately for fans of DeMars' music, USC's conducting program had been put on hold, and at length DeMars returned to Minnesota and to composition. He completed his doctoral studies at the University of Minnesota where his major teachers included Dominick Argento, Eric Stokes and Homer Lambrecht. It was during this time that he joined Joseph Holmquist to create the Zeitgeist Ensemble.

"I was performing a new work; although I often performed avant-garde music, this time I sensed that this was not communicating. It was so cold. I felt as I played that I was losing the audience, and nothing in the piece allowed me to do anything about it, I was more machine than performer."

DeMars flirted with the avant-garde though, over time, it seemed beside the point. In 1981, he took a position on the faculty of the School of Music at Arizona State University, Tempe, Arizona. The change complemented his new direction. "Arizona was this blossoming place that could grow into anything," DeMars recalls. "I decided I could become anything, too. I start writing intuitively."

DeMars' intuition led him to the world music sources that were at the time opening up everywhere. Unlike 20 or even 10 years previous, the 1980s afforded the curious exposure to musics from every continent. DeMars responded with an astounding series of pieces that referenced other cultures while remaining within the written traditions of Western art music. There was The Prophet, a cantata based on the writings of the great Sufi poet, on Rumi; Two World Concerto for Native American flute and orchestra; Native Drumming, for Pow-wowisingers and orchestra; Tito's Say, an Hispanic cantata; Sabar for African drum ensemble with orchestra. This period of integrating non-Western languages climaxed in his collaboration with Parisianiarchitect and poet, Michel Sarda, in the creation creation of An American Requiem. DeMars is currently engaged with Canyon Records in a setting of the Nican Mopohua (Visions of the Virgin of Guadalupe) for chorus, soloists, orchestra and ethnic ensemble.