“Music is the playground where technique and inspiration meet. It’s a unique expression that only happens once in time. The by-product of incredible music is that it changes people’s lives. My job as a composer is to create music that transports the listener to a different place than where they started out and to do it in a way that supports the intentions of the project.”

While other children in day care wanted to fast forward through nap time, James Eakin was pressing the replay button. He reflects on the early days, “The day care attendant would play the most incredible solo piano piece during nap time and I would think about it all day long. I was obsessed. Years later I realized it was Beethoven’s ‘Moonlight Sonata’.”

Following in Beethoven’s pioneering foot steps, James broke the mold in rural Louisiana where the title of “Professional Composer” wasn’t commonplace. He began his career running off to take piano lessons at his local church but his piano playing career came to a screeching halt when his teacher got transferred to another city. He says, “I had to get resourceful. Since I didn’t have any music to study I started writing my own.” And thus a composer was born.

It wasn’t until years later that James began his formal musical studies. In 2007, he received a Doctorate of Musical Arts in Music Composition at the Conservatory of Music, University of Missouri-Kansas City.

James has had the privilege of studying with some of music’s most prominent composers: John Corigliano, Jeff Rona, Jack Smalley, George Tsontakis, Bruce Broughton, and Chen Yi.

He has composed works for Maya Angelou’s 80th Birthday celebration, the President’s Christmas Gala at the White House, and the Aspen Music Festival to name a few. James will have his Carnegie Hall debut in 2012.

On his philosophy of composing James says, “I do not draw lines in the sand when it comes to music. I always say that I go from Mozart to Metallica in zero seconds flat. My goal as a composer is to bridge the gap between traditional and contemporary music.”

James composes with the speed of a film composer and the attention to detail of a concert composer. His grasp of today’s current music technology, his extensive knowledge of various musical styles, periods, instrumentation, and orchestration techniques makes him a force to be reckoned with…that coupled with the fact that he has black belts in Kenpo, Judo, and Aikido and can bench press over four hundred pounds.

-Biography by Amanda Lazar