Jean Michel André Jarre was born on 24th August 1948 in Lyon by France Pejot (a member of the resistance during World War 2). His father is the renowned Maurice Jarre, who have composed music scores for movies like "Doctor Zhivago" and "Lawrence of Arabia". When Jean Michel was 5 years old, his father moved to Hollywood, to compose. Jean Michel didn't see that much to his father, from that time on.

JMJ used to live 6 months every year of his first 8 years, with his grandparents in Lyon. Every year a fairground would be installed near his grandparents flat, so this is where it all began, since he has been inspired by the circus and fairgrounds (i.e. Magnetic Fields Part V).

As a teenager, Jean Michel Jarre attended an art-exhibition where a french artist had made paintings only in black and white, and with different textures. This played a big part in Jarre's life, when he first laid hands on a synthesizer, because it made him realize that he also could be a painter, but with sounds and frequencies instead of a brush.

Jarre started studying music seriously in Paris with "Groupe de Recherches Musicales" (The Music Research Group), run by Pierre Schaeffer. Pierre Schaeffer is the one, who introduced Jean Michel to the synthesizers, and was like a father to JMJ, in absence of his real father. He produced his first vinyl single "La Cage" in 1971. In 1972 he produced the LP "Deserted Palace" and in 1973 the movie score "Les Granges Brulées".

But it was not until 1976, when he produced "Oxygene", that he became famous. In 1978 "Equinoxe" followed, and on 14th July 1979, Jarre gave his first concert in Place de la Concorde, which was the beginning of what his future concerts would be like. After the concert, Mick Jagger from The Rolling Stones said "I've never seen anything like that before". This concert was also Jarre's first entry in Guiness Book of Records, because there was about 1 million spectators.

In 1981 Jarre produced "Magnetic Fields", and in 1982 he decided to make the concerts in China. He was the first westerner to play in China, since the communist revolution. The opening night was in Peking, and only official communist party members and members of the army, attended the concert. As it is tradition in China during classical performances, nobody clapped their hands. Jarre and his crew did not know this and he didn't feel like he connected to the real chinese people. So for the second concert, he bought all the tickets and handed them out on the street. This was what Jarre wanted, and the people where ecstatic. The concerts resulted in the first double-LP from Jarre called "The Concerts in China".

In 1983 Jarre also did a first. He made the album called "Music for the Supermarkets". Some of the numbers on this albums, are promo-versions of some Zoolook and Rendez-Vous tracks. The master recording was destroyed and the original album was auctioned and sold for £10000. This was done to make the statement, that music also a form of art: instead of visible paintings, you have mental paintings. But before the auction, there was a radiobroadcast with the music, and Jarre announced "Pirate it!". This was done, so there is now a great deal of bootlegs of the album, but every bootleg of "Music for the Supermarkets" there is, is in mono because the broadcast was from Radio Luxemburg.

"Zoolook" came out in 1984, and was remarkable in a way, because all the music was composed using only sampled human voices from around the world.

In 1986 Jarre released "Rendez-Vous" and was asked by NASA to do a concert for NASA's 25th anniversary. The show should have contained a link-up with the Challenger Space Shuttle, where the astronaut Ron McNair should have played the saxophone on the track called "Last Rendez-Vous - Ron's Piece". But the space shuttle exploded only a minute after leaving the ground, killing all 7 astronauts. This accident almost cancelled the concert, but NASA and other astronauts wanted the concert to go ahead as planned, but being a tribute to the crew of Challenger. The concert made the track "Rendez-Vous IV" very famous, and it's a track that is played at almost every concert Jarre does. The concert made Jarre's 2nd entry in the Guiness Book of Records, as 1.3 million attended the concert.

After the Rendez-Vous Houston-concert, Jarre did the Rendez-Vous Lyon-concert, where the Pope started the concert by blessing it.

"Revolutions" was released in 1988, and the following year, Jarre did the Destination Docklands-concert, which is one of the most rewarding concerts, that Jarre has ever done. This is due to the fact, that no-one had ever played in the Docklands, and the weather was terrible with freezing winds and showering rain. It is also a very memorable concert for JMJ, because the late Princess Diana attended the concert.

In 1990 the "Waiting for Cousteau" album was released, and Jarre did a great concert on the Bastille-day in Paris. This concert had gigantic puppets on stage, and an audience of approx. 2.5 million people, which earned Jarre a third record in G.B.O.R.

JMJ released "Chronologie" in 1993, and did the "Europe in Concert"-tour. In 1994 he did the Hong Kong-concert, which resulted in a live double-CD.

The continuation of Oxygene came in 1997, and was naturally named "Oxygene 7-13". With this album, Jarre returned to some of the basics, that made him famous. Again Jarre did a tour, this time the Oxygene World Tour. It also resulted in the celebration of Moscows 850th anniversary. There was a link-up to space - which was intended for the Houston-concert, but this time it was a link-up to the MIR-spacestation. This concert earned Jarre his 4th entry in G.B.O.R. due the attendence of about 3.5 million people.

In 1998 the World-cup was held in France, and to celebrate it, Jarre held a concert at the Eiffel-tower in Paris. The music-style was more hip-hopped and remixed, than the fans was used to, and resulted in a lot of discussion of Jarre's use of this kind of music. A troubled fan wrote a letter, saying that he had travelled 1000 kilometers just to see Jean Michel, and he didn't see anything!!!. No need to say, that he was very disappointed with this performance.

The 31st December 1999 Jarre held a New Year's concert in the Gizeh Plateau in Egypt. It was a concert that celebrated the new Millenium, and used the three great pyramids as the stage. This concert was a huge success, and has resulted in a great deal of bootlegs.

In january 2000 the latest album from Jean Michel Jarre was released. It is called "Metamorphoses", and signalled a change in Jarre's music. It's the first time, that Jarre has used vocals on his tracks. 2 singles were released from the album, "C'est la Vie" and "Tout est Bleu". A third single was supposed to have been released during autumn of 2000, but it was cancelled due to concertplans.

January 1st 2001 a concert was held in Okinawa, where Jarre performed as a part of the group "The Vizitors". The different tracks at the concert were introduced by Arthur C. Clarke, live by a satelite-uplink. Shortly after the concert, it was rumoured that an album from "The Vizitors" was forthcoming, but was cancelled later on.

Jarre performed a concert in Akropolis, Greece on June 19th and 20th 2001. It contained a new track - fittingly called "Akropolis". On the second night, Ethnicolor was not played to the disappointment of the fans.

April 12th 2002 in Bourges, France Jarre performed his most intimate concert yet, as only 100 persons were invited. The tracks played at the concert were: AOR (Bleu), Metamorphoses (also played in Avignon), Bourges I and Bourges II. The Bourges-tracks was completely new material from Jarre, and is highly experimental.

September 7th 2002 Jarre performed the Aero-concert in Denmark near Aalborg, using windmills as a backdrop for the concert. During the show, Jarre played together with Safri Duo on a remake of the Bourges II-track performed at the Le Printemps de Bourges Audiobrunch. This was in retrospect a rather small concert for Jarre, as there was only tickets for 35.000 people, but the tickets were completely sold out in 10 days - very fast in Denmark. The show did go ahead, eventhough it looked like it had to be cancelled on the very same day due to a lot of rain. The field was turned into a field of mud, and a lot of criticism has been (in my opinion) wrongfully given to Muskelsvindfonden, who organized the concert. People should have paid more attention to the weather forecasts, and now people are complaining about mud ruining their shoes - so why didn't you guys and girls bring decent footwear?

In November 2002 a new album called "Sessions 2000" was released. It's a more jazzy-ambient album, with no real big hits on it. It's an album that you have to listen to several times before it starts to grow on you.

In March 2003 the soundtrack from "Les Granges Brulées" was re-released, but this time on CD.

On July 10th 2003 a pre-release party was held at The VIP Room in Paris for the release of the album "Geometry of Love" (maybe also to celebrate the move from the Sony-label to Warner?). This album was officially released on September 9th. The album is project Jarre did for The VIP Room, and is a lounge-style album.

Mid 2004 Dreyfus released "The Essential" album on CD as the last release on this label. Obviously an attempt to make money one last time on their greatest artistname.

During the 2nd half of 2003 the rumoured album "Aero" was going to be released for Christmas, but the album could not be finished in time and was then scheduled for release in March or April 2004. However, the release-date was moved once again and the album wasn't released until August 2004. The album consists of a CD and a DVD. On the DVD all the music has been reworked into Dolby Digital 5.1 surround sound, creating a new soundscape for the listener - very cool indeed. The tracks are reused from earlier works but 3 new tracks has been composed for the release.