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Jean-Baptiste Barrière (b. 1958) recieved training in music, philosophy and mathematical logic. Along with his career in composition, he was at IRCAM/Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris from 1981-1998, first as a researcher, then as the director of Musical Research (1984-1987), Education (1989-1998), and Production (1993-1998). In September 1998, he left IRCAM to concentrate on composition.

His electroacoustic cycle Pandemonium (1975-1976) was presented on two records on the Atem label in 1978 and 1979. His piece Chréode, won the Prix de la Musique Numérique of the Concours International de Musique Electro-acoustique of Bourges in 1983, and is published on a Wergo CD.

He has composed the music of several multimedia shows, including Collisions (with Kaija Saariaho), directed by Pierre Friloux and Françoise Gedanken, premiered in 1984 at the Festival Ars Electronica in Linz.

He has realized the music of an installation with image synthesis of Pierre Friloux, for the International Festival of New York, exhibited during the summer of 1988 inside a pillar of the Brooklyn Bridge, and then later at the Festival de Montréal.

In 1995, he realized the music of the virtual reality piece Le Messager of Catherine Ikam and Louis Fléri, presented in the exhibition Cité-Ciné 2, at La Colline de La Défense; and in 1996, the one of Alex, presented at IRCAM.

In September 1996, he also realized the sound portion of the virtual reality piece Le diable est-il courbe? of Maurice Benayoun, presented in the Etats généraux de lÕécriture interactive, at the Vidéothèque de Paris.

In 1997, he directed the realization of the soundtrack for the exhibition Flying over water by Peter Greenaway, presented in the Miro Foundation in Barcelona. He then composed the music of 100 Objects to Represent the World, a show by Peter Greenaway premiered at the Salzburg Festival in August 1997, of which a CD was released by IRCAM.

He has composed the music of several virtual reality pieces by Maurice Benayoun, Worldskin, premiered at the Ars Electronica Festival in September 1997 (which also won the Prix Ars Electronica 1998 for Interactive Art), as well as the Tunnel Paris-New Delhi, a televirtuality piece between the Cité des Sciences in Paris and india, from January 10th to February 1998 for the celebrations of the fifty years of the Indian Republic, and Crossingtalks, premiered October 1999 in the ICC museum in Tokyo.

He has also conceived and directed the realization of the CD-ROM Prisma, discovering contemporary music through the works of Kaija Saariaho, published by WSOY in 1999.

He is currently developing Reality Checks, a cycle of installations and performance pieces involving solo instrumentalists and the live transformation of sound and image. He has also realized Autoportrait in motion, a sound and image interactive installation, commissioned by the Contemporary Museum of Zurich, premiered in January 1998 and also party of the Reality Checks cycle. The first performance piece in this cycle, Cellitude, for cello, was published as an enhanced-CD on the Petals label in 1999.

He is currently also working on various installation projects with Peter Greenaway and Maurice Benayoun.