Jean de Reydellet

From building my own drum and exploring the sonorities of the family's piano at four, to picking up a classical guitar and modifying it at twelve, experimenting with sound has always attracted me.

At sixteen, I visited my uncle Georges Quellet in Switzerland, the inventor of the Stellavox tape recorders. One afternoon, he played a recording—a dinner with conversations, ambient noises, etc.— that was of such high quality, yet dating from the mid-fifties, that I felt totally immersed into it. I have never forgotten the feeling I had that day: sound can create near perfect realism.

Shortly after, I started to sing in Orange, a band that lasted for about five years and did quite well. The keyboard and the guitar player reunited later and formed the French duo Air.

I received classical education within the Music Department at University of Paris VIII, specialized in computer music and met Professor Horacio Vaggione. Not only did he teach the tools used to manipulate audio, but he would always assign musical topics within a broader range of knowledge. My Master's thesis was a study on sound effects and how they are integrated in composition.

Curtis Roads, teaching at the University of Paris VIII, charged me with the French version of "The Computer Music Tutorial". This allowed me to assimilate numerous techniques involved in sound manipulation. He later made me integrate the "Ateliers UPIC" studios, founded and chaired by composer Iannis Xenakis. There, I was lucky to meet major personalities of the electronic music during four years.

I have, among other things, written articles for magazines such as Play/Record or MacWorld, been in charge of a CD-ROM's soundtrack on the Olympic Games of Atlanta, and composed music for television. I have also translated for companies such as BIAS, MakeMusic, or MetricHalo, to continue my researches on sound in parallel.

These arrived at a certain maturity and I decided to use them in practical applications. My goal was to keep researching and use the acquired knowledge on music and sound: Synaesthesia Studios was born.