 Jean Michel Jarre was born in Lyon on 24 August 1948 , to France <unk> , a French Resistance member and concentration camp survivor , and Maurice Jarre , a composer . When Jarre was five , his parents split up and his father moved to America , leaving him with his mother . He did not see his father again until reaching the age of 18 . For the first eight years of his life , Jarre spent six months each year at his maternal grandparents ' flat on the Cours de Verdun , in the <unk> district of Lyon . Jarre 's grandfather was an oboe player , engineer and inventor , designing an early audio mixer used at Radio Lyon . He also gave Jean Michel his first record player . From his vantage point high above the pavement , the young French boy was able to watch street performers at work , an experience he later cited as proving influential on his art . 
