Jules Etienne Biography

Nothing is more difficult for multi-instrumentalist Jules Etienne than answering the question: “what kind of music do you do?” Since his first release in 2003 called “French journey” (on a compilation with David Grubb), Jules Etienne has cultivated diversity as a musician, producer and composer making a classification of his work almost impossible.

In the suburbs of Paris, as a child and teenager, in music school, Jules was interested by Gypsy music while learning the violin. Later he got an old East German guitar as a present. He repaired the instrument and learned it by himself, writing numerous songs, while playing the violin and the drums in music school. After graduating, he decided to move to Germany to study Philosophy. While being a student and working for the radio, Jules was introduced to electronic music. Meanwhile, he discovered the computer as a medium to record and make music. It was a revolution for him since he had never been able to record his music before. With this medium new inspiration came along and Jules started producing electronic music. He also mixed this new component with his most traditional compositions.

This passion for electronic music was the reason for Jules relocation to Berlin. In the German capital, Jules met Alessandro Tartari, who had left Italy for Berlin also looking for fresh inspiration. Their friendship and similar taste leaded them to make music together. Gui.tar was born. Boris, a Berlin DJ at panorama bar, heard their music and offered them a deal with careless records right away. Numerous records were released under the name gui.tar, which all landed on compilations. The Junior Boys and Ewan Pearson amongst others supported gui.tar’s musical vision. Alessandro and Jules played in lots of places in Berlin and the rest of the world such as: the new panorama bar, bar 25, Cassero in Bologna (Italy), also in Sweden and in Vietnam.

With the time nostalgia for music with content came up. “It’s very frustrating to make music for people that are only waiting for the next bassdrum”, recalls Jules, who decided to not use his laptop as a music instrument anymore. Therefore, he came back to a more traditional way of making music. With Alessandro and their common friend Massimiliano Pagliara, they created [sic!] with the intention of performing their music on stage without any computer. During that time, Jules also started again to compose acoustic songs like he used to do as a teenager. Jules’s songs are short to avoid the use of the cut and paste function. They are stories about living in one’s mind, which is a part of our world as well.

Nowadays, Jules plays his folk songs with his band (Yanneck Salvo at the Pianet and Jules Valeron at the Bass) and records music in the kottkott studio for films and other projects. He plays the drums for Steev Lermercier’s Lalaby and the guitar for Snax live band the Snakettes. Within Jules Valeron’s Coconuts he’s percussionist. He repairs vintage keyboards and synthesizers in his atelier.