Electronic music pioneer Jean-Jacques Perrey dies at 87
LAUSANNE, Switzerland — Jean-Jacques Perrey, the French composer and pioneer of electronic pop music who was best known for co-writing “Baroque Hoedown” used as the music for the Main Street Electrical Parade at Disney theme parks, has died at age 87.
Perrey died in Lausanne, Switzerland, on Friday “from a very quick and violent lung cancer,” his daughter, Patricia Leroy, said.
Electronic music composer Dana Countryman, in a tribute to his frequent collaborator posted on Facebook, noted that Perrey began recording electronic music in 1952, long before the Moog synthesizer was first offered for sale in 1967, calling him “truly the pioneer of popular electronic music.”
“His crazy, happy music has been heard everywhere, from commercials to ‘Sesame Street’ — in hip-hop songs, in dance remixes and most famously, for decades in the delightful featured music in Disneyland’s ‘Main Street Electrical Parade.’ In recent years, his music has even made appearances on ‘The Simpsons,’ and on Comedy Central’s ‘South Park,'” Countryman wrote.