Curt Close

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Curt Close (23 October 1975 in Waremme, Belgium) is a Belgian writer, composer and singer. In February 2002, his song Ton Image was in the French and Belgian Top 40.^[1]

At the age of 10, he started to play the piano by ear instead of being taught to play it. He composed his first song at the age of 14 and began to perform at small school concerts. When he was 19, he met Pierre Rapsat, a composer and performer who became his mentor and friend, and with whom he would write several songs. Later on, an advertisement led to a meeting with Nicolas Varak, a producer at Paris who signed him up with East West (Warner Music France) for his first album Le vent se lève.

Philippe Delettrez oversaw the production and musical arrangements. The recording work took place in Paris and Los Angeles with the best French and American musicians: Jean Mora at the keyboard, Emmanuel Vergeade on guitar, Denis Benarrosch on percussion, Marc Berthoumieux on the accordion, Didier Dessers writing for strings, Abraham Laboriel Sr (whose previous work was with Michael Jackson, Elton John) on bass, Abraham Laboriel Jr (Sting, Paul McCartney, Johnny Hallyday, Mylène Farmer) on drums, Brad Cole (Phil Collins) on piano and keyboard. Le vent se lève was released in March 2002.

In 2004, Catherine Lara asked Curt Close if he would play the role of Merlin in her musical comedy Graal in January 2005, with Franco Dragone as producer, but the show did not go ahead.