Jean Michele Jarre
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Jean Michele Jarre was born in 1948 into a family of noted audio abilities. His grandfather was involved in the invention of the first mixing board in French radio, and his father was the noted composer of cinema scores, Maurice. Jean Michele started playing the piano at age 5 under guidance of Jeannine Rueff of the Paris Conservatoire. He was involved with a number of musical research and development groups such as Pierre Schaeffer's Music Research Group and Concrete Music Group. In 1971 Jean Michel composed the music for the ballet 'Aor', Hebrew for light. There were seven sections, based on the seven colours of the rainbow.

In 1972 Jarre put out his first solo LP 'Deserted Palace' and wrote the film soundtrack for 'Les Granges Brulees'.

In 1976 Jarre recorded 'Oxygene' LP. He signed to Disques Dreyfus and Oxygene was released by Polygram in 1977, further enhancing sales and Jarre's popularity and standing. Oxygene was one of the seminal synthesiser albums of the 1970's. It propelled Jarre into the international limelight and was a milestone in electronic music. Oxygene differed from a lot of previous electronic music in that it was warm and organic sounding, had a very well constructed melodic and rhythmic structure. It had all the elements to ensure that it is still as enjoyable today as it was then. Good tunes, epic grandeur and a definite progressive narrative.

Jarre asserts that Oxygene did not have a conceptual theme. Equinoxe (1978) was intended "to reflect the passage of a 24 hour day, with each part of the music representing different times of the day or night" and was intended to be played at different times and moods of the listener.

Jarre intended for the music to be "functional" and used to augment the activities of the listener. This was dismissed by some critics as Muzak was for the way it blends into the background. This is a concept of the use of music which was also echoed by Brian Eno who began writing music to be used by artists in their studios.

In 1979 one million people attended the concert given by Jean Michel Jarre at "Place de la Concorde" for the Bastille Day celebrations. This set the pace for many of the concerts to follow.

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