Jean-Jacques Perrey

Jean Marcel Leroy was born on 20 January 1929[3] in Amiens,[4][5][6] a small town located in the north of France.[7] His first instrument, the Accordion, was received at age 4 on the 1933 Christmas Eve.[8] Besides learning to play the piano,[9] he studied music at the Conservatory of Amiens[10] in which he, in the company of some friends, formed a group dedicated entirely to jazz. However, as the conservatory was prohibited from performing in public, the director issued a final warning that said: «continue playing jazz or continue your studies».[9] After being expelled from the conservatory,[10] Perrey graduated in the Lycée d'Amiens, and he would dedicate himself to studying medicine in Paris School of Medicine for four years, During his studies he aspired to pursue scientific research,[8] read science fiction books,[11] and occasionally worked as an accordionist.[6]

In 1951, Perrey after hearing Georges Jenny promoting the ondioline on a French radio show,[12] he asked for Georges Jenny's phone number to work as a publicist for Ondioline, in exchange for receiving one. After Jenny accept the deal, Perrey became the most virtuoso player of Ondioline and abandoned his medical career to dedicate himself entirely to electronic music.[13] He traveled throughout almost all of Europe including France, country where he was born and made his first trips, in addition he attended several international music fairs.[11] In Paris, Perrey performed a cabaret act known as «Around the World in 80 Ways» in which he simultaneously played both the piano and the Ondioline,[11] the act gained quite a bit of popularity and it toured for Western Europe, working at the nightclub circuit.[10]

Perrey began making his electronic music recordings in 1952, long before the Moog synthesizer was released.[4] However his first album was Prelude au Sommeil (Prelude to Sleep),[14] a 1957 "auditory recipe" that was used to induce sleep to insomniacs.[8] In addition, Perrey in a 2008 documentary explained that: "During my medical studies, I met a psychologist and psychiatrist who explained to me that sound had a positive and negative influence on the human being".[6] On the other hand, this album was released on May 27, 2017.[15] In 1959 was released a LP titled "Cadmus, Le Robot de l'Espace", on the Phillips label,[16] in collaboration with the French composer and filmmaker Henri Gruel.[17]

In that same year, during his stay in Paris, Perrey met Charles Trenet,[11] a composer and singer who after hearing about Perrey and the Ondioline,[18] he invite to record the song L'ame des Poetes (The Soul of Poets),[19] and to accompany him on stage.[11] Later the composition was an international success, and Perrey met other composers such as Yves Montand and Jacques Brel.[8] In 1959 he also performed at the Olympia Theater in Paris with singer French Edith Piaf, who was a great supporter of Perrey's work.[10]

After meeting with Pierre Schaeffer, inventor behind the musique concrete at the Study of Contemporary Music Research in France,[20] Perrey had become interested in the manipulation of tapes. Piaf after sending one of the tapes to the music contractor resident in the New York city, Caroll Bratman, to which he responded by sending Perrey some plane tickets with the phrase "Come!".[10]

In March 1960, Perrey relocated to New York,[14] Perrey during his stay in United States was sponsored by music contractor Carroll Bratman, who in addition to paying living expenses at the Bristol Hotel on West 48th Street,[11] built him an experimental laboratory and recording studio. In which invented "a new process for generating rhythms with sequences and loops", utilizing the environmental sounds of "musique concrète" created by Pierre Schaeffer,[10] in his studio he worked quite hard, sometimes working 36 hours straight. Perrey would later make his television debut on the program "The Jack Parr Show", being quite successful in this, later he would make more appearances on television programs such as The Gary Moore Show, I Have a Secret, Captain Kangaroo, or The Tonight Show.[11] In addition composed jingles for radio and television.[10]

In 1960 he released an EP in Vinyl 7 inch format with the "Pacific" label titled "Mr.Ondioline".[21] Years later this became one of the EPs most sought after by collectors of electronic music.[22] In 1962 Perrey released the album entitled "Musique Electronique du Cosmos (Electronic Music From Outer Space)".[23] Only 500 copies of this album were produced.[24] In 2017 the album was relaunched in Spain by the Wah-Wah Records label, being remastered by Roger Prades.[25] One of the remaining copies on eBay was purchased by music collector DJ Zero.[26] During the 1960s, he met and composed several television and radio jingles with Harry Breuer and Andy Badale, a composer who wrote and composed with Perrey, "Visa To The Stars", a theme that was later used as the main theme of a commercial for Esso.[11]

After befriending Robert Moog, he became one of the first Moog synthesiser musicians, creating "far out electronic entertainment",[12] and in addition, incorporated the name of the Moog synthesizer in some of his albums like: "Moog Indigo", "Moog Generation", "Moog Mig Mag Moog" or "Moog is Moog".[27] In 1965 at the residence of Perrey's sponsor, Carroll Bratman, met Gershon Kingsley,[28] a former colleague of John Cage, and personal arranger for Vanguard,[21] Perrey and Kingsley created two albums for the company Vanguard — The In Sound From Way Out! (1966) and Kaleidoscopic Vibrations: Electronic Pop Music From Way Out (1967) respectively.[29] He also produced music for advertising, radio and television with Kingsley.[14]

Harry Breuer, one of the first musicians what Perrey met in New York City,[30] recorded together with Perrey the album «The Happy Moog» at the studios Caroll Instrument Rental Company from New York City, while Perrey played the Moog synthesizer and other keyboards, Breuer played mainly percussion, xylophone and sometimes used keyboards. Pickwick, the record company from the album, in the late 1960s and early 1970s was famous for releasing recordsthat got the most out of the artists of the time, sometimes sacrificing demo discs.[31] The album was manufactured by "Keel Mfg. Corp" and published by "Ondotronics, Inc" and "Mourbar Muisc Corporation" in 1969 with the Pickwick label in the countries U.S.A., UK and Canada.[32] Perrey credited Harry Breuer, for the musical inspiration and help it gave him in the business of working in a studio.[30] Later he collaborated on an album for the label Pickwick, titled "Switched-On Santa" with Sy Mann.[33]

Perrey for family reasons, he returned to France in 1970,[28] became the musical director of a ballet company,[21] and continued investigated therapeutic sounds to heal people with insomnia,[34] this included a project that involved recording with dolphins in the waters of Vancouver, Canada.[21] He also recorded music for commercials and animated television series French, and released some albums on the label "Montparnasse 2000", David Chazam encouraged Perrey to continue performing, and Perrey continued to do live performances at various venues in the United States.[10]

Perrey at August, 29 2006

In 1998 he collaborated with the band Air to composed the song "Remember" from album Moon Safari and "Cosmic Bird",[35] in 2006, Perrey began collaborating with producer Luke Vibert for a CD on England's Lo Records, Moog Acid. The duo performed concerts in New York City and Montreal in October 2008 to promote its release. The album is notable for Perrey being almost 80 years old when it was released. The result was a blend of retro and modern analogue house synth-pop, encapsulating many genres and the two respective styles of the artists. The CD was released in 2007.[36] On September 23, 2008 in collaboration with Dana Countryman, released Destination Space.[37]

In 2010, Belgian-Australian musician Wouter De Backer (known professionally as Gotye) wrote and composed a song tremendously inspired by Perrey's work, so he decided to contact him to send him the track. Perrey who was 80 years old at the time and lived in Lausanne, Switzerland. Over the next three years, Gotye visited Perrey seven more times.[38] In addition Gotye for years searched for every Ondioline s he could find, then painstakingly restored as part of an effort to preserve the Perrey and instrument's legacy.[39] In that same year Dana Countryman wrote and released a biography of Perrey titled "Passport to the Future". In May 2015 he released his last album entitled "ELA" in collaboration with David Shazam.[27]

In November 2015 De Backer came to have more than 11 Ondiolines. In 2016 De Backer formed the Ondioline Orchestra, whose debut was scheduled for November 22 of that year at Williamsburg, Brooklyn. Perrey reported that he could not travel due to health problems he was having at that time. A little more than a month before the scheduled date, his daughter called to say that he had changed his mind, and that he was going to go.[38] However Perrey died at the age of 87 on November 4, 2016 due to a Lung cancer, according to stories by Patricia Leroy to Associated Press.[40] In 2017 De Backer performed from January 16-17 at the Sydney Festival a concert titled "Gotye Presents a Tribute to Jean-Jacques Perrey", later on January 20, 2017 that same concert was performed at the Melbourne Recital centre.[38]

On 13 February 2018, de Backer and their Ondioline Orchestra, a group consisting of Rob Schwimmer, Joe McGinty, Sean Dixon, Nick Oddy, Jacob Silver and De Backer himself, presented the concert Gotye Presents a Tribute to Jean-Jacques Perrey in the night opening of the Roulette's Mixology Festival.[41] De Backer created the label, «Forgotten Futures», whose first release was Jean-Jacques Perrey et son Ondioline,[42] a compilation album released on May 12, 2017, consisting of rare and unreleased audio tracks compiled by Gotye, Dana Countryman, Pat Prilly, etc,[43] in addition Gotye worked with some engineers to be able to mastering original Perrey recordings using their Ondioline.[38] In July 2017 Gotye's Ondioline Orchestra presented again the concert titled "Gotye Presents a Tribute to Jean-Jacques Perrey" in Australia, the concert won a Helpmann Award in the Contemporary Music category.[44]

• 1957: Prelude au Sommeil (Institut Dormiphone)
• 1959: Cadmus, Le Robot de l'Espace (with Henri Gruel) (Phillips)
• 1962: Musique Electronique du Cosmos (Electronic Music From Outer Space) (MusiCues)
• 1966: The In Sound From Way Out! (with Gershon Kingsley) (Vanguard)
• 1967: Kaleidoscopic Vibrations: Electronic Pop Music From Way Out (reissued in 1971 under the title «Kaleidoscopic Vibrations: Spotlight On The Moog») (with Gershon Kingsley) (Vanguard)
• 1968: The Amazing New Electronic Pop Sound of Jean Jacques Perrey (Vanguard)
• 1968: Electronic Music
• 1969: The Happy Moog (with Harry Breuer) (Pickwick)
• 1969: Switched On Santa (as engineer from recording and mixing) (with Sy Mann) (Pickwick)
• 1970: Moog Indigo (Vanguard)
• 1971: Moog Sensations (Sonosyntheses Electroniques) (released only in France and Italy under the title "Moogmusic" in 1972, in 2001 was released by Dare-Dare label) (Editions Montparnasse 2000)
• 1972: Moog Expressions (released only in France and Italy under the title "Moog Suono Del Domani" in that same year) (Editions Montparnasse 2000)
• 1972: Moog Generation (only in France) (Editions Montparnasse 2000/Zero International Records)
• 1974: Moog Mig Mag Moog (Editions Montparnasse 2000)
• 1976: Dynamoog (with Gilbert Sigrist) (Mondiophone/Crea Sound Ltd)
• 1977: Moog is Moog (with Harry Breuer) (Editions Montparnasse 2000)
• 1980: Kartoonery (with Daniel Longuein and Guy Boyer) (Editions Montparnasse 2000)
• 1982: Energize with Exercise (with Bette and Ione Darrel) (Black & White)
• 1998: Eclektronics (reissued in 2002 under the BASTA label) (with David Chazam) (Basetonic)
• 2000: Circus Of Life (with Gilbert Sigrist and O.C. Banks) (Koka Media)
• 2006: The Happy Electropop Music Machine (with Dana Countryman) (Olgio)
• 2007: Moog Acid (with Luke Vibert) (Lo Recordings)
• 2008: Destination Space (with Dana Countryman) (Oglio)
• 2010: Froots (with Cosmic Pocket) (In-Vitro Records)
• 2014: ELA (with David Chazam) (Freaksville)

• 1973: The Best Of The Moog (with Gershon Kingsley) (Vanguard)
• 1975: Incredible Synthesizer (with Gershon Kingsley) (Vanguard)
• 1988: The Essential Perrey and Kingsley (reissued in 1996 and 2006) (Vanguard)
• 2000: Good Moog: Astral Animations and Komputer Kartoons (Kosinus)
• 2001: The Out Sound From Way In! The Complete Vanguard Recordings (Vanguard)
• 2007: Vanguard Visionaries: Perrey and Kingsley (Vanguard)
• 2017: Jean-Jacques Perrey Et son Ondioline (Forgotten Futures)
• 2019: Past Future Sound Tracks

• 1959: Les Folles Aventures d'omer et de Jacques Courtois: Omer en Synovie (Polydor)
• 1971: Glop (Riviera)
• 2006: Moog (with The Moog Cookbook) (Oglio)

• 1960: Mr.Ondioline (Pacific)

Two pieces by Perrey were used as themes principal for television comedy shows created and starring by Mexican comedian "Chespirito" (Roberto Gómez Bolaños): "The Elephant Never Forgets", composed by Perrey, Breuer and Gary Carol,[73] was used as the main theme for El Chavo,[74] and "Baroque Hoedown" as the closing theme for El Chapulín Colorado.[75] In 2009, Perrey filed a formal suit against the Mexican media conglomerate Televisa over unauthorized usage of his music over decades. The case was eventually settled and Bolaños himself was never a party of the lawsuit. Consequently, Perrey's credit is now prominently mentioned on any promotional materials concerning any of Chespirito's shows using his music, particularly El Chavo del Ocho.[76]

Some of Perrey's compositions were used in the Japanese program started in 1973 called Ultraman Taro: