BIOGRAPHY
Born in Paris, Loup spent his childhood between London and Paris with his musician parents. In 1984, at the age of 3, Loup Barrow took his first lessons with a violinist from the London Symphony Orchestra, who visited him every week in a small apartment in East London where he lived with his musician mother. He played the violin until his return to France in 1988, when he was offered a Gretsch drum kit by Dave Wickins (a British jazz drummer and family friend).
Loup played drums in a number of projects before turning to instruments whose sounds attracted him: the dulcimer, steel drums, Din Pah and the chromatic Mbira. He was introduced to percussion while touring with his parents in South Africa, and continued his training on one of his trips to Morocco with Mustafa Tuita. In Guadeloupe, he studied steel pans with Guy Louiset. During a trip to Venice, he came across the glass harp. Attracted by its crystalline tones, he built himself an instrument that he has mastered and incorporated into numerous musical projects.
CRISTAL BASCHET
His encounter with this unique instrument, the Cristal Baschet, was decisive for Loup and his career. In 2005, he crossed paths with the Baschet brothers, electro-acoustic geniuses who, in the 20th century, invented the Baschet instrumentarium and the Cristal Baschet, the centerpiece of their work.
Loup immediately became attached to this unique and rare instrument. Since his meeting with the Baschet brothers, Loup has brought the Cristal Baschet to the forefront of the international scene, using it for both classical and contemporary repertoire.
Since the Baschet brothers’ death, Loup has never ceased to honor this heritage, making the Cristal Baschet resonate in an original repertoire at festivals and events around the world. Conscious of the need to promote a little-known French instrument, Loup works passionately to develop an international network, surrounding himself with renowned artists in France and abroad.
His collaboration with the musician Guo Gan, grandmaster of the erhu (Chinese two-stringed fiddle), has taken him on numerous trips to China, where he meets an extremely wide audience. He released an album with Guo Gan: “The Kite” in 2014 on the Felmay Records label. In 2019, Loup Barrow records the album “Silent Witness” in collaboration with Radek Bond Bednarz and Mieko Myazaki.
