No spectacular fireworks display in Paris this year.

To celebrate the transition to 2021, Paris has instead opted for a Jean-Michel Jarre concert in virtual reality in digitized Notre-Dame, an event to be followed in particular on YouTube and Facebook, the musician and the city announced on Tuesday, December 8. 

From 11:25 pm to 12:15 am, Jean-Michel Jarre will perform live and appear as an avatar in the cathedral which had been fully digitized before the fire in April 2019. The event being 100% virtual , nothing will happen on the spot.  

"With Anne Hidalgo, we wondered how to celebrate December 31 in another way, in an innovative way, confinement required", explains Jean-Michel Jarre. 

"Welcome elsewhere" 

Sponsored by Unesco, this immersive concert of a new kind is called "Welcome to the other side", "Bienvenue autre" in French.

"It will be both a message of hope for 2021 in the difficult times we are going through, but also an opportunity to pay tribute to Notre-Dame, weakened like all of us," adds the musician. 

"We are honored, with the dozens of creators and technicians who have been working on this immersive concert for several weeks, to contribute, despite these difficult times, to making Paris resonate at midnight on December 31, and thus to launch an invitation to the whole world to make it virtually to the heart of the City of Light, ”he adds.

The musician has specially re-orchestrated his album "Electronica". 

A first"

For Anne Hidalgo, who is delighted with "this first in the history of Paris", "this concert in a digital format will allow everyone to follow the event live and experience the transition to the year 2021" . 

Completely free and accessible anywhere in the world, this virtual concert produced with the French start-up VRrOOm, will be broadcast live on VRchat, YouTube, Facebook, on France Inter, BFMTV Paris and the city of Paris website. 

With AFP

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