REVOLUTION MAGAZINE PROUDLY PRESENTS

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September 1^st 1996, Aston University, Birmingham

Around 200 people descended on Birmingham for Rendez-vous 96 - the 3rd UK Jean Michel Jarre Convention. The convention, which had many attractions and events throughout the day, took place at the Guild Hall in Aston University, Birmingham on September 1st 1996.

To kick it off, the compere, Edward Bradley, introduced everyone to the convention - then invited everyone to join in the first event - the 'Jarre Fan of 1996' quiz. A very popular event indeed, which consisted of three rounds: Round 1 consisted of simple questions to select fans for the quiz from everyone in the audience. Round 2 had more difficult questions, to whittle down the fans to just three for the final round.

For Round 3, finalists Michael Smith, Simon Daw, and Gary Campsie were asked to select an envelope, each of which contained questions on a particular subject from Jean Michel Jarre's life and music. They were then asked ten questions on either "The early life of Jean Michel Jarre", "Instruments" or "Albums and singles".

After a tie-break between Gary and Simon, Gary Campsie from Cardiff was congratulated as the winner, and given the title 'Jarre Fan of 1996'. Prizes were then given to all three finalists, Simon Daw, Michael Smith and Gary Campsie.

Track listing for the concert performed by Karl Pethers, Adrian Goodswen and Chris Goodswen:

After a short break, Karl Pethers (keyboards and sequencing), Adrian Goodswen (keyboards) and Chris Goodswen (guitar and keyboards) performed an excellent set of Jarre covers, and the set performed received a very good reception from fans. Highlights were the rarely-performed Magnetic Fields 4, and Ethnicolor, which they were very brave to attempt!

Media were there on the day, and Central TV interviewed Dave Knight, Patrick Rondat and various fans. They also filmed the concert by Karl, Adrian and Chris but unfortunately this was never shown on TV, and we are unable to obtain copies of the footage. Throughout the day, Pete Winnard took the role of DJ and when there was free time between events, he played various remixes and other singles, some of which rarely heard - and of course took requests from the fans too.

In the bar, fans could relax and buy drinks, food and other refreshments while chatting to other fans who they had met on the day. In one corner, a video show played all day showing some excellent promotional videos, a recent video performance from UNESCO's headquarters in Paris, the short concert at Festa Italiana, rare footage from concerts and loads more. This was kindly produced by Warrior Video especially for the day, and even had subtitled translations..!

As usual, many exhibitors displayed their wares throughout the Guild Hall, along with fan clubs from throughout Europe who attended the day. Jean Michel Jarre CDs, merchandise, T-shirts, photos etc. were all for sale, and in many cases at bargain prices too! Even though there were some rare items for sale, the main rarities to view on the day was the exhibition. This contained merchandise, photos, CDs and box sets, and was on view throughout the day at the back of the hall, and had Rendez-vous Houston - A City in Concert as the main theme (to celebrate it's 10th Anniversary). It also contained many items from the whole of Jean Michel Jarre's career.

Later in the day, Dave Knight, Wayne Davis (Destination Jarre), and John van der Stap (ex-Jarre Mania) took part in a friendly and informal Question and Answer session - which consisted of queries about forthcoming concerts, questions about rare LPs like Music for Supermarkets and even one fan who asked if Jean Michel's daughter is single!

Towards the end of the day, an auction took place which contained much rare merchandise, some donated from fans, and also many donated items from Jean Michel Jarre, Patrick Rondat and UNESCO. A total of £1,140 has been donated (detailed below), which has finally been donated to UNESCO by Revolution Magazine, on behalf of the Rendez-vous 96 team.

Some of the most interesting items which appeared in the auction were the items donated from Jean Michel Jarre - this included a number of Concert for Tolerance pins, an autographed Concert for Tolerance poster, and three cassettes performed at UNESCO's HQ - Song for Tolerance (Eldorado). Patrick Rondat had donated some rare promo CD singles of Vivaldi Tribute and his plectrum which he used in the concert which he had performed earlier in the day. UNESCO gave a number of autographed books and promotional photographs of Jean Michel Jarre at UNESCO events to the auction, and a unique art print from Croatian artist and fan, Mario Rosanda Ros.

Thanks to the many people who gave items for the auction, and the amount of money raised was phenomenal! From the many people involved with the day, a big thank you must go to Penney Bell for working so hard to get the extremely generous donations from Jean Michel Jarre and Patrick Rondat !!

List of items auctioned - raising £1,140 for UNESCO:

Patrick Rondat, our special guest for the day, spent the majority of the day meeting fans and kindly signing many autographs, not to mention numerous photos! It was an excellent opportunity to meet Patrick, who was very courteous to the fans, and told us he had a lot of fun throughout the day.

However, the highlight of the day must be the 'secret' concert performance planned with Johan Schurer (part of Mercurey - an excellent Dutch band). All the tracks were played faultlessly and the whole concert was extremely exciting!! The crowd really enjoyed the half-hour performance, which ended much too quickly, and were clapping and cheering all the way through! Johan recreated Jean Michel's tracks superbly, and with Patrick Rondat's superb additions to the songs, it was simply awesome!!

Patrick also played some tracks from his excellent 'Amphibia' album (produced by Jean Michel Jarre) with Amphibia part 4 and the excellent interpretation of Equinoxe 4 being my own personal highlights from the CD. For more details on Patrick Rondat, and the official fan club, click here for the Gateway to Rondat web site.

Track listing for the concert by Patrick Rondat and Johan Schurer

Rendez-vous 96 took around eighteen months of planning and a lot of work from a dedicated team of fans - and the day went ahead with very few problems at all! The team would like to thank both Patrick Rondat and Michel Vitte for coming all the way from France for the day, and a special thank you to the people who sponsored their trip over from France, and would like to remain anonymous.

With such a large mass of Jean Michel Jarre fans, it also meant that the team who produced Rendez-vous 96 were able to once again meet many fans - a number of which had also come to the previous two conventions - and it was brilliant to see so many new faces too! There is an excellent community of fans who enjoy Jean Michel Jarre's music and it is always a pleasure to meet up with everyone - which we were also able to do during the recent Oxygene Tour quite extensively!

The majority of the team involved with RV96 are now producing the next UK Jean Michel Jarre convention for August 23rd 1998 at the same venue as RV96, Aston University. The JarreCon '98 team are all really looking forward to meeting everyone and it will once again be a day not to be missed !!

Click here for more details.

[Click above button for more details on the team who produced this event.]