JEAN-MICHEL JARRE

Random and bite-sized facts on all things on the mythical electronic figure that is Jean-Michel Jarre. Totally random but totally fascinating if you're into it. Do you know Jean-Michel Jarre now?

--

JARRE TREATED VOICES LIKE SYNTHESIZER OSCILLATORS

For "Zoolook", Jean-Michel Jarre took fragments of human speech and treated them as musical instruments rather than words. He said his aim was to use voices with the same attitude as a Moog or modular synthesizer.

--

JARRE USED HIS NEIGHBOUR'S VOICE ON ZOOLOOK

Not all the voices on "Zoolook" came from exotic locations. Jarre said he sampled speech from France, China, Africa, Eskimos and Indians — and even recorded his next-door neighbour in Paris.

--

ZOOLOOK TOOK JARRE ALMOST TWO YEARS

Jarre later said "Zoolook" took almost two years to complete, including four months of mixing. He used four engineers during the process and admitted that everyone was exhausted while he was still unhappy with the result.

--

THE FAIRLIGHT WAS THE MAIN INSTRUMENT

When asked which instrument he used to make "Zoolook", Jarre's answer was simple: "the Fairlight, the Fairlight and again the Fairlight." He regarded it as important as a guitar or piano.

--

JARRE DIDN'T CARE WHAT THE WORDS MEANT

Jarre selected many of the vocal fragments on "Zoolook" for their phonetic and musical qualities rather than their meaning. He wanted the sound of the voice itself to become part of the music.

--

LAURIE ANDERSON MADE UP HER OWN LANGUAGE

For "Diva", Laurie Anderson didn't sing words from an existing language. Jarre asked her to invent the vocal sounds, which he then incorporated into the track alongside the Fairlight and other instruments.

--

--

JARRE USED SELLOTAPE TO MAKE TWO DRUM RHYTHMS PLAY TOGETHER

For "Oxygène Part IV", Jean-Michel Jarre used a Korg Mini-Pops 7 rhythm machine and held down two preset rhythm buttons with Sellotape. The result combined the "rock" and "slow rock" patterns.

--

OXYGÈNE PART II WAS WRITTEN ON A BARELY WORKING MELLOTRON

Jarre found an old Mellotron at Ferber Studios with only a few working keys. He still used it to write "Oxygène Part II".

--

JARRE USED A REVOX TO CREATE OXYGÈNE'S HUGE SENSE OF SPACE

Jarre discovered that delaying sound through a Revox tape machine could create a huge sense of space. The technique became part of the distinctive sound of "Oxygène".

--

THE OXYGÈNE TITLE CAME FROM THE COVER ART

The title "Oxygène" came from Michel Granger's artwork. Jarre saw the painting in Paris in 1976 and used its existing title for the album.

--

JARRE COULDN'T PLAY OXYGÈNE LIVE WHEN IT WAS RELEASED

When Jarre was asked in 1982 whether he had performed "Oxygène" live, his answer was simply "No". The technology and setup made reproducing the album on stage impractical at the time.

--

OXYGÈNE WAS RECORDED ON AN 8-TRACK

Jarre recorded "Oxygène" using an 8-track Scully tape machine. Despite the limited number of tracks, he created an album with an enormous and highly layered sound.

--

JARRE CALLED THE VCS3 A "PUNK" SYNTHESIZER

Jarre later described the VCS3 as almost a "punk" synthesizer. Rather than having the huge systems available to American musicians, he saw limitations as something that could help create an individual sound.

--

--

JARRE TOOK 15 TONS OF EQUIPMENT TO CHINA

For his 1981 concerts in China, Jean-Michel Jarre took around 300 boxes of equipment from Paris, weighing about 15 tons. The shipment included 30 synthesizers, 35 amplifiers, 120 loudspeakers, eight lighting towers and three laser tubes.

--

THE FIRST BEIJING CONCERT NEARLY DIDN'T HAPPEN

Jarre's first concert in Beijing almost had to be cancelled when the main power-supply cable couldn't be found. It was finally located just two hours before he was due on stage.

--

JARRE WROTE SEVEN NEW PIECES FOR CHINA

Jarre composed seven new pieces especially for his 1981 Chinese concerts. The new material moved between electronic, ambient and Chinese-influenced music.

--

THE FIRST CHINESE SHOW WAS FOR MILITARY PERSONNEL

The audience at Jarre's first Beijing concert consisted exclusively of military personnel. Wanting ordinary Chinese people to experience the concerts too, he gave tickets to people in the streets for the following shows.

--

HALF THE BEIJING AUDIENCE LEFT BEFORE THE END

During the first Beijing concert, about half the audience left before the end because Beijing's buses stopped running at around 10pm. Jarre's spectacular electronic show had an unexpected transport problem.

--

JARRE BROUGHT THE LASER HARP TO CHINA

The China concerts featured Jarre's first use of the laser harp, an instrument that became one of the defining visual elements of his later live shows.

--

CONCERTS IN CHINA WASN'T JUST A LIVE ALBUM

Jarre later described "The Concerts in China" as a live album but also partly a studio album. Seven new compositions were created for the Chinese project and several were incorporated into the double album.

--

JARRE SAID PLAYING IN CHINA WAS LIKE "PLAYING ON THE MOON"

Jarre later described his 1981 Chinese concerts as feeling like "playing on the moon". For him, the cultural and musical circumstances were unlike anything he had experienced before.

--

--

JARRE'S LASER HARP WAS DAMAGED BY RAIN

The laser harp was damaged by rain the night before Jarre's 1986 Houston concert. He said it was repaired just five minutes before he played it during the show.

--

HOUSTON'S SKYSCRAPERS BECAME GIANT SCREENS

Jarre turned Houston's skyscrapers into enormous projection screens, with images and laser effects covering buildings as high as 70 storeys.

--

16,000 PYROTECHNIC EFFECTS WERE USED

More than 16,000 synchronised pyrotechnic effects were used during "Rendez-Vous Houston", turning the city's skyline into part of the performance.

--

THE AUDIENCE WAS ENCOURAGED TO BRING RADIOS

The concert was simulcast on FM radio, and people were encouraged to bring radios so they could hear Jarre's music while watching the show across Houston.

--

JARRE'S CREW WORKED ON THE SHOW FOR EIGHT MONTHS

Jarre's team of around 300 to 400 technicians worked for more than eight months preparing the huge Houston production.

--

THE SHOW ALMOST HAD A WEATHER PROBLEM BEFORE IT STARTED

Rain had already damaged equipment before the concert, while low clouds created another problem for the lasers. Jarre later said the laser harp was not as bright as it should have been.

--

THE CONCERT COST MILLIONS TO STAGE

"Rendez-Vous Houston" cost an estimated $3–4 million to stage, despite being a free concert for the public.

--

THE FREE CONCERT CREATED A MASSIVE TRAFFIC JAM

More than a million people came to see Jarre's Houston show, and the crowds were so large that traffic on the freeways around downtown Houston came to a standstill.

--

--

JARRE PLAYED GUITAR IN A BAND CALLED THE DUSTBINS

Before becoming famous for electronic music, Jean-Michel Jarre played guitar in a Paris group called The Dustbins. The band appeared in the 1967 French film "Des garçons et des filles".

--

JARRE WAS EXPERIMENTING WITH TAPE BEFORE SYNTHESIZERS

Jarre's early experiments involved cutting and manipulating magnetic tape, using scissors and tape to transform recorded sounds before he became known for synthesizers.

--

THE VCS3 WAS JARRE'S FIRST SYNTHESIZER

The EMS VCS3 was the first synthesizer Jean-Michel Jarre owned. He became fascinated by its unusual, unpredictable sounds and continued to use the instrument throughout his career.

--

JARRE WORKED AT PIERRE SCHAEFFER'S GRM

Jarre worked at Pierre Schaeffer's Groupe de Recherches Musicales in Paris during the late 1960s and early 1970s, experimenting with recorded sound and electronic music.

--

JARRE WANTED ELECTRONIC MUSIC TO HAVE EMOTION

Although he learned from Pierre Schaeffer's highly experimental approach at the GRM, Jarre later said he wanted to bring more emotion and sensitivity into electronic music.

--

JARRE WAS FASCINATED BY THE HUMAN VOICE

Jarre's experiments with recorded voices at the GRM helped shape his later approach to treating voices as sound rather than simply as words. The idea became particularly important on "Zoolook".

--

JARRE'S EARLY MUSIC USED SCISSORS AND SELLOTAPE

Before digital editing, Jarre physically cut and joined pieces of magnetic tape to manipulate sounds. He later described these early experiments as "scissors and Sellotape" music.

--

JARRE STILL HAS A SOFT SPOT FOR THE VCS3

Decades after first discovering the VCS3, Jarre continued to describe the small British synthesizer as one of the instruments closest to him.

--

JARRE'S EARLY ELECTRONIC MUSIC GREW OUT OF SOUND EXPERIMENTS

Rather than beginning with conventional songs and replacing instruments with synthesizers, Jarre's early electronic work grew from manipulating tape, recorded sounds, voices and electronic textures.

--

--

JARRE SOLD PAINTINGS AS A CHILD

As a child, Jean-Michel Jarre made paintings to help his mother financially. Because he was too young to have credibility, he invented an older brother and sold the paintings under his name.

--

JARRE'S GRANDFATHER HELPED SHAPE HIS LOVE OF SOUND

Jarre's grandfather was an engineer and inventor who worked on audio equipment. He gave Jean-Michel a second-hand tape recorder when he was a child, helping spark his fascination with recorded sound.

--

JARRE SOLD HIS GUITAR TO BUY A SYNTHESIZER

Jarre sold his guitar and amplifier to raise money for an EMS VCS3. He then travelled to London and visited EMS co-founder Peter Zinovieff.

--

JARRE ONCE PLAYED TO ONLY 100 PEOPLE

In 2002, Jarre gave an unusually intimate performance at Le Printemps de Bourges. The event was a masterclass and performance for an audience of no more than about 100 people.

--

JARRE TURNED A PARIS SQUARE INTO A CONCERT STAGE

In 1979, Jarre performed a huge open-air concert at Paris's Place de la Concorde. Giant projections, lighting and fireworks transformed the entire square into part of the performance.

--

JARRE WANTED TO BRING EXPERIMENTAL MUSIC TO A BIGGER AUDIENCE

After working at Pierre Schaeffer's GRM, Jarre wanted to take experimental electronic techniques beyond the specialist world and connect them with popular music.

--

JARRE USED A THEREMIN IN A 2002 MASTERCLASS

During his 2002 Le Printemps de Bourges performance, Jarre demonstrated the history of electronic music using early instruments including a Theremin alongside synthesizers.

--

JARRE RECREATED OXYGÈNE WITH THE ORIGINAL INSTRUMENTS

For his "Oxygène in Concert" project, Jarre returned to the original analogue synthesizers used on the 1976 album and rebuilt the music for live performance.

--

JARRE'S FIRST OPEN-AIR CONCERT CHANGED HIS IDEA OF LIVE MUSIC

The 1979 Place de la Concorde performance helped establish Jarre's idea of using an entire cityscape as part of a concert, rather than treating the stage as the only visual focus.

--

--

JARRE ONCE RELEASED AN ALBUM WITH ONLY ONE COPY

In 1983 Jarre created Music for Supermarkets and pressed just one copy. The master matrix was destroyed after the record was auctioned, turning it into one of the rarest albums in music history.

--

JARRE'S FIRST SINGLE WAS MADE BEFORE OXYGÈNE

In 1970 Jarre released “La Cage/Erosmachine”, a strange early electronic single that came years before Oxygène. It was his first proper release under his own name.

--

JARRE ONCE PLAYED IN A GARAGE BAND

As a teenager Jarre played guitar and sang in a Paris garage band called The Dustbins. But he became more interested in recording and manipulating the band's sounds on tape.

--

DESERTED PALACE WAS MADE WITH JUST ONE INSTRUMENT

Michel Geiss later pointed out that Jarre's early album Deserted Palace was made using only one instrument. Geiss regarded the result as remarkable given how limited the equipment was.

--

WAITING FOR COUSTEAU ENDS WITH A 47-MINUTE TRACK

The title track of Waiting for Cousteau is an enormous 47-minute ambient piece. Jarre's official site says it was composed with the help of a computer program.

--

ZOOLOOK USED VOICES FROM MORE THAN 25 LANGUAGES

For Zoolook, Jarre treated human voices almost like synthesizer sounds, using recordings from more than 25 languages and processing them with the Fairlight CMI.

--

LAURIE ANDERSON INVENTED A LANGUAGE FOR JARRE

For “Diva” on Zoolook, Laurie Anderson was asked to sing in an imaginary language rather than use normal words. Jarre wanted the voice to function as another electronic sound.

--

JARRE AND HANK MARVIN MADE A TRACK OVER THE PHONE

“London Kid” from Revolutions was a collaboration with Hank Marvin. Marvin was living in Australia, so the two worked on the song with each other over the telephone.

--

JARRE USED THE FAIRLIGHT LIKE A MUSICAL INSTRUMENT

While making Zoolook, Jarre described the Fairlight CMI as being as important to him as a guitar or piano. He said the album would have been difficult to make without it.

--

--

MAGNETIC FIELDS WAS JARRE'S FIRST BIG STEP INTO SAMPLING

Magnetic Fields was one of the early albums to use sampling as a genuine musical element. Jarre used the new Fairlight CMI to bring recorded sounds into his electronic compositions.

--

JARRE CHANGED STUDIOS FOR MAGNETIC FIELDS

After making Oxygène and Équinoxe in his makeshift studio, Jarre moved to a different setup for Magnetic Fields. He later said the change was part of the album's new approach.

--

THE ALBUM WAS INSPIRED PARTLY BY ANDY WARHOL

Jarre's official site says Magnetic Fields was partially inspired by Andy Warhol. The album was also conceived as a tribute to the machines that powered Jarre's music.

--

MAGNETIC FIELDS STARTS WITH A NEARLY 18-MINUTE PIECE

The opening track, “Magnetic Fields Part 1”, lasts almost 18 minutes. The rest of the album is divided into four much shorter pieces, making the first track an unusually huge opening statement.

--

JARRE MIXED OLD ANALOGUE SOUNDS WITH DIGITAL TECHNOLOGY

Magnetic Fields sits at an interesting point in Jarre's career: familiar analogue synthesizers were joined by the Fairlight's new digital sampling technology.

--

JARRE TREATED TECHNOLOGY AS PART OF THE COMPOSITION

Jarre later explained that technology doesn't simply serve music — it can actually shape the music that gets made. Magnetic Fields was a particularly clear example of that idea.

--

THE FRENCH TITLE HAS A HIDDEN WORDPLAY

The French title is Les Chants Magnétiques, literally “Magnetic Songs”. It sounds almost identical to Les Champs Magnétiques, meaning “Magnetic Fields”.

--

THE ALBUM WAS RECORDED IN JARRE'S PRIVATE STUDIO

The recording and mixing credits place Magnetic Fields at Jarre's private Croissy Studio in Croissy-sur-Seine, with Jarre himself credited as producer and mixer alongside the engineering team.

--

--