Jean Michel Jarre Essentials & Rarities (2011)

This pleasant techno hybrid remixes mostly Chronologie with a few sustainable classics (Equinoxe 4 & 7, Magnetic Fields 2, Calypso, Revolutions) and tries to bridge the gap between contemporary Jarre and late 90s dance. This is better considered a B-side of Chronologie, and so long as you loved that, or old skool techno, you might take to this.

While it can be easy to dislike and dismiss some cookie-cutter electronic music, the challenge lies in finding reasons to listen to it again. Such is the case with Revolutions by Jean Michel Jarre. One reviewer wrote, simply, "(This) is not revolutionary." That is true; Jarre breaks no new ground with the release of this album. He does, however, continue to create original music in his own style. He is often imitated and that is the sincerest form of flattery. This album features ten short pieces (five minutes and 22 seconds is the longest) of pop influenced e-music. This disc neither challenges nor offends the listener. It has its moments but it neither soars nor plunges. Of course, die-hard Jarre fans will love this disc. Fans of Synergy, Char-El, Klaus Schulze, and Ashra will like it.

French synthesizer guru Jean-Michel Jarre brought progressive electronic music to the mainstream, releasing several best-selling albums that helped pave the way for synth pop, new age, and trance, in addition to performing extravagant, record-breaking concerts. He became a household name following the release of 1976's Oxygène, a home-recorded synth odyssey that eventually sold more than 12 million copies worldwide. Following its success, he began staging large-scale outdoor concerts featuring laser displays and fireworks, breaking the world record for concert attendance three times. He became the first Western artist to perform in China, and the events were documented on the 1982 release The Concerts in China…

The Concerts in China is a live album by Jean Michel Jarre, recorded in 1981 and released in 1982 on Disques Dreyfus. It was recorded during Jarre's Concerts in China tour of Autumn 1981, which consisted of five Beijing and Shanghai concerts in China; this was the first time a Western pop artist performed in China after the Cultural Revolution. The album is a balance of previously released tracks by Jarre, new compositions inspired by Chinese culture, and one rearranged traditional Chinese track ("Fishing Junks at Sunset"). The album consists mainly of live material, plus ambient sound recordings and one new studio track "Souvenir of China". Other new compositions recorded live include "Night in Shanghai", "Laser Harp", "Arpegiator" and "Orient Express". "Fishing Junks at Sunset" is a new arrangement of a very old traditional Chinese song known as the "Fisherman's Chant at Dusk", which was performed and recorded with The Peking Conservatoire Symphony Orchestra and is often wrongly attributed as being composed by Jean Michel Jarre, misled by the album inlay.

Digitally remastered edition of this 1986 album from the French composer, performer and music producer. Jean Michel, the son of acclaimed film composer Maurice Jarre, is a pioneer in the Electronic, Ambient and New Age genres. Apart from his recorded output, Jean Michel Jarre is also fondly known as an organizer of outdoor spectacles of his music featuring lights, laser displays, and fireworks. Jean Michel has gone on to sell well over 80 million albums in the course of 40 years.

As the follow-up album to Oxygene, Equinoxe offers the same mesmerizing affect, with rapid spinning sequencer washes and bubbling synthesizer portions all lilting back and forth to stardust scatterings of electronic pastiches…

Celebrated as the European electronic music community's premier ambassador, composer Jean-Michel Jarre elevated the synthesizer to new peaks of popularity during the 1970s, in the process emerging as an international superstar renowned for his dazzling concert spectacles. Jarre has sold an estimated 80 million albums and singles. Musik aus Zeit Und Raum (Music from Time and Space) is a compilation album by Jean-Michel Jarre originally released in 1983.

Just after his live performance in Houston to celebrate NASA's anniversary, Jean-Michel Jarre released Rendez-Vous, an appropriately cosmic-sounding album of glittering synth pop. It consists of the same music heard at the Houston concert and shows Jarre moving closer to conventional rock territory, though still with his distinct blueprint. The final track, "Last Rendez-Vous: Ron's Piece," was composed by Jarre for astronaut Ron McNair and was intended to be the first musical piece played and recorded in space. McNair's historic duty was cut short, however, by the Challenger shuttle disaster of January 1986.