From his vantage point high above the pavement, the young Jarre was able to observe street performers at work, an experience he later cited as proving influential on his art. Jarre struggled with classical piano studies, although he later changed teachers and worked on his scales. A more general interest in musical instruments was sparked by his discovery at the Saint-Ouen flea market, where his mother sold antiques, of a Boris Vian trumpet violin. He often accompanied his mother to Le Chat Qui Pêche (The Fishing Cat), a friend's Paris jazz club, where saxophonists Archie Shepp and John Coltrane, and trumpet players Don Cherry and Chet Baker were regular performers. These early jazz experiences suggested to him that music may be "descriptive, without lyrics". He was also influenced by the work of French artist Pierre Soulages, whose exhibition at the Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris he attended. Soulages' paintings used multiple textured layers, and Jarre realised that "for the first time in music, you could act as a painter with frequencies and sounds." He was also influenced by classical, modernist music; in a 2004 interview for "The Guardian", he spoke of the effect that a performance of Stravinsky's "The Rite of Spring" had upon him:  As a young man Jarre earned money by selling his paintings, exhibiting some of his works at the Lyon Gallery – "L'Œil écoute", and by playing in a band called Mystère IV. While he studied at the , his mother arranged for him to take lessons in harmony, counterpoint and fugue with Jeannine Rueff of the Conservatoire de Paris. In 1967 he played guitar in a band called "The Dustbins", who appear in the film "". He mixed instruments including the electric guitar and the flute with tape effects and other sounds. More experimentation followed in 1968, when he began to use tape loops, radios and other electronic devices, but joining the Groupe de Recherches Musicales (GRM) in 1969, then under the direction of Pierre Schaeffer ("father" of musique concrète), proved hugely influential. Jarre was introduced to the Moog modular synthesizer and spent time working at the studio of influential German composer Karlheinz Stockhausen in Cologne. In the kitchen of his flat on Rue de la Trémoille, near the Champs-Élysées, Jarre set up a small recording studio.