Claude Barthélemy (also spelled Barthélémy on many releases and in databases) is a French guitarist, oud player and composer, born on August 22, 1956 in Saint-Denis, north of Paris. He taught himself guitar from the age of fourteen, grew up in the suburbs and for several years hesitated between music and mathematics, playing in local bands and then in jazz-rock groups, among them Œdipe. In late 1978 he was hired by Michel Portal, and the regular work in Portal's "Unit" ensembles that followed launched his career; French Wikipedia lists among the musicians of those projects the percussionist Jean-Pierre Drouet, François Jeanneau, Jean-François Jenny-Clark, Daniel Humair, the trombonist George Lewis and Bernard Lubat.

His first record as a leader, Jaune et encore (Cobalt, 1979), was recorded in Paris with the bassist Henri Texier, the keyboard player Mico Nissim, the violinist Michel Ripoche and, on three tracks, the drummer Aldo Romano; Barthélemy plays electric and bass guitar and arranged the pieces. The same year he is on Romano's Il Piacere (Owl), a quartet record with Portal and Jenny-Clark, on which Discogs credits him with bass and guitar. Forest One (Celluloid, 1981) is a set of his own pieces with the flautist James Newton, Nissim and the drummer François Laizeau, and Moderne (Owl, 1983), recorded in Paris at the end of December 1982, is a quintet record with the bassist Jean-Luc Ponthieux, the drummer Jacques Mahieux, the saxophonist Jean-Marc Padovani and the tubist Gérard Buquet. He also recorded in a trio with the American drummer Stu Martin and the guitarist Gérard Marais, Sunrise (Marge, 1980, recorded in Paris in November 1979), and is one of the guitarists on Marais's B.B.G. (Big Band de Guitares) (Open, 1984); French Wikipedia dates his place in Marais's big band to 1981. In 1991 his guitar is on Vinko Globokar's Les Émigrés (harmonia mundi, recorded live in May 1990), and in 1999 he plays guitar and was art director on Yaala by the Malian singer Nahawa Doumbia.

The middle of the decade brought Real Polit!-K (Big Noise, 1986), on which Michel Godard plays tuba and bass trombone alongside Padovani, the saxophonist Sylvain Kassap and the keyboard player Olivier Hutman, and a series of mixed-ensemble works: French Wikipedia lists a 1986 piece with Padovani for brass quintet, musical sculptures and jazz quartet, La Gomme (1987) for string quartet, jazz quintet, voice, mime and video, and a 1988 work on Rodrigo's Concierto de Aranjuez with the brass ensemble Concert Arban. In 1987 he co-founded the collective Zhivaro with Marais, Didier Levallet, Henri Texier, Mahieux and Kassap, according to the same source. From 1989 to 1991 he was the third artistic director of the Orchestre national de jazz, the national orchestra: Claire (Label Bleu, recorded in December 1989) and Jack-Line (Label Bleu, 1991) feature Godard on tuba, the bassist Renaud Garcia-Fons, the reed player Michael Riessler, the accordionist Jean-Louis Matinier and Nissim on piano. Riessler's own What a Time (Label Bleu, 1991) has Barthélemy on electric guitar and electric bass on two tracks, with Godard on serpent.

After the ONJ he went back to a trio with Ponthieux and the drummer Manuel Denizet, recorded as Solide (Evidence, 1993) in July 1993, and to a quartet with the saxophonist Daunik Lazro, the bassist Claude Tchamitchian and the drummer Christophe Marguet, which made Monsieur Claude (Deux Z, 1996). AllMusic also notes incidental music for Shakespeare productions and for ballet, and collaborations with visual artists. Sereine (Label Bleu, 2000), recorded in May and July 2000 in Amiens, brought together the Mahieux father and son, the accordionist Didier Ithursarry, the vibraphonist Franck Tortiller and the saxophonist Philippe Lemoine, with the singer Élise Caron, Médéric Collignon and the pianist Bojan Z (credited on Discogs as Bojan Zulfikarpašić) as guests.

In November 2002 he formed a second ONJ and directed it until 2005; French Wikipedia describes his return as a first for the institution. French Wikipedia says he brought in younger players, among them Collignon and the trombonist Sébastien Llado, and the repertoire was largely his own compositions, with Barthélemy on oud as well as guitar. It made Admirabelamour (Label Bleu), recorded in Amiens in December 2002, and La Fête de l'eau (Le Chant du Monde, 2004), recorded in May and June 2004, and toured Canada in 2004, a tour released on DVD. A concert listing for the orchestra at Épinay-sur-Seine on March 18, 2003 names Barthélemy for composition, direction, guitar, oud and bouzouki.

His later work has centred on the oud, on song forms and on small projects. After meeting the clarinettist Fred Pouget and his ensemble L'Occidentale de fanfare at the Europa Jazz festival in Le Mans in 2004, he reworked the group's repertoire, released as Claude Barthélemy & L'Occidentale (Laborie Jazz, 2015). At the Sons Neufs festival at Le Sunset in Paris in November 2010 he played oud in a trio with the percussionist Pablo Cueco and the oboist Jean-Luc Fillon. Lieder (3=tomato, 2012) is a set of songs with vocalists Charlène Martin, Josette Kalifa and Maria-Laura Baccarini, and Roxinelle (Le Maxiphone Collectif, 2016) is a trio record with the Hammond organist Antonin Rayon and the drummer Philippe Gleizes on which he plays oud and a 1976 Firebird guitar. From 2013 to 2015 he took part in the literary concert Ultraviolet with the writer Nancy Huston, and in 2022 French Wikipedia lists him as co-writer of the show 50/50 - Janis Joplin / Jimi Hendrix for the ensembles TrioPolycordes and Sequenza 9.3. His Bandcamp page, which gives Paris as his base, carries Panorama, a nine-track set released on June 20, 2024.

Barthélemy is a guitarist of speed and quotation. AllMusic notes that he has been billed as the world's fastest guitarist and that his playing is full of stylistic references to rock, pop and jazz, and a 1994 Télérama review reproduced by the label Frémeaux & Associés places him among the fast post-Hendrix guitarists in the line of John McLaughlin and Allan Holdsworth. His starting points were jazz rock, folk-punk and atonal funk, and his records of the 1980s and 1990s mix those with free jazz, theatre music and contemporary composition; in one 2010 concert report he is quoted as calling jazz a state of mind rather than a style. In the 2000s the oud became a regular second voice next to the electric guitar: he is credited on guitar and oud on Admirabelamour and La Fête de l'eau, and plays it again on Roxinelle. As a composer and arranger for the ONJ he leaned on collage, humour and homage: the sleeve of La Fête de l'eau dedicates pieces to Kurt Cobain, Count Basie, Herbie Hancock and Beethoven, and the album includes a version of Coltrane's "Giant Steps". Much of his output sits between jazz rock, free improvisation and song forms, so no single tag covers it; the Subgenres above are the closest canonical matches.