Éliane Radigue, the French composer known for pioneering meditative drone-based electronic music and musique concrète, died in Paris on February 24, 2026. She was 94. Her family announced the death, and the cause of death was undisclosed.
Radigue developed a distinctive, minimalist approach to long-duration listening, building many works through careful ARP 2500 modular synthesizer sound design that became her core instrument for decades.
Her career grew from the postwar French electronic studio world. She joined Pierre Schaeffer’s Studio d’Essai milieu in 1955 and later assisted Pierre Henry, including work connected to Apocalypse de Jean in 1968. From 1963 onward in New York, her feedback and tape-based explorations intersected with minimalism and drew attention from figures such as James Tenney, Philip Glass, and Steve Reich.
Later works expanded her methods beyond electronics. Her Trilogie de la mort (1990–1998) was explicitly linked to her Buddhist practice, and the multi-work OCCAM cycle brought her slow, attentive process into collaborations with instrumentalists and continues to be performed. In 2019, ZKM | Center for Art and Media Karlsruhe honored her contributions to the development of electronic music.