Claude Salmieri

Claude Salmieri was born in Tunis to a family of Italian musicians. His father, a professional drummer, put him behind his first drum kit at the age of five.At the age of eight he entered the percussion class at the Conservatoire of Saint Maur and began learning musical notation. He began the piano at the same time.In 1974, at the age of fifteen, he was accepted at the National Conservatoire in Paris. He had left Saint Maur with an award for classical piano and he obtained first prize for percussion in Paris.In 1976 he commenced his career by accompanying Yves Simon, the David Rose Group and Robert Charlebois. From 1978 to 1980 it was his experience with Magma that helped him squeeze out more energy at Christian Vander’s side.Very soon after, he played on a number of albums with artists such as Ray Charles, F. Gall, M. Berger, Renaud, Don Cherry and Marvin Gaye. He also played on stage with artists such as Lalo Schiffrin, F. Cabrel, V. Sanson and Vladimir Cosma, with whom he worked on movie soundtracks.In 1988 he played with Paga groupe. In 1991 he recorded his first album, ‘Self portrait’. In 1996 he founded the group ‘STS’ with Jannick Top and Eric Seva and recorded the album, ‘Système Solaire’. Claude Salmiéri has also been involved with a variety of comedy musicals such as Starmania, Tycoon and The Hunchback of Notre Dame.More recently he has formed his own Jazz trio, Light Night. In November 2006 he accompanied Larry Carlton and Robben Ford at the ‘New Morning’ jazz club in Paris.