The Curse of Creativity: François Lamoureux and the Art of Unearthing Hidden Potential
François Lamoureux believes that true creativity leads to transformative ideas that can inspire and solve real problems. All you need to do is dig for that gold.
What’s the secret to groundbreaking ideas? François Lamoureux, a man who lives where art, science, and innovation collide, has a sharp answer: “The best ideas are buried in places we rarely look at.”
To François, CEO of CXC™ and Fogo®.tv, it’s not just the finished masterpiece that matters. It’s everything that never saw the light of day—the songs that stayed unfinished, the scientific breakthroughs that never left the lab. These unrealized ideas? They’re the real tragedy. And they’re far more common than most people realize.
François Lamoureux is one of the rare individuals living at the intersection of art and science, working at an elite level in both fields. As a producer-director in the music industry, Lamoureux has worked with industry icons while enabling transformative scientific breakthroughs at CXC™ through his work with leading university researchers. His journey through both realms allows him a unique vantage point on the importance of creativity—and the consequences of unrealized potential.
“The graveyard, for me, is where great ideas go to die,” François explains. “It’s not just about music or art. In science, it’s where ideas that could save lives or change the world end up buried. It’s the place where dreams go unnoticed.”
François speaks of the ‘curse of creativity,’ a powerful force he believes stifles many would-be innovators. “True creativity, whether in art or science, is rare,” he says. “It leads to transformative ideas, the kinds that can inspire us and solve real problems. But so many great ideas never see the light of day. They’re never realized. They die in the graveyard.”
“You can be an excellent performer of Beethoven or Chopin, but there’s a world of difference between performing and composing like them,” François says. “The role I play—whether in music or science—is to help people go beyond mere performance. I enable the composition to occur. I help them realize their ideas.”
That role, François argues, is to help creative people—whether musicians or scientists—navigate the “curse” of creativity. He helps them overcome the fear of failure, the daunting dragon of doubt, that can keep many from fully manifesting their visions. “My job is to create conditions where ideas can thrive,” he explains. “It’s recognizing that glimmer of greatness and allowing it to fully come to life.”
“I have been very fortunate to have worked with, and helped, some great artists. For instance, being in charge of the Rush archive for about 20 years and overseeing the transfer and restoration of their whole catalog into a digital archive proved to be an amazing experience as I was privy to the creative process that went into making all that great music. You would need to listen 10 hours a day, seven days a week for 10 weeks just to go through the material that made up the 10 to 12 hours of released original material. And I got to record the band a couple of times for R30 and Snakes & Arrows Live.”
Another great experience was working with Dweezil Zappa on Frank Zappa’s music, which ended up winning Dweezil and the band the only Grammy a Zappa has won. “Working with Dweezil was an incredible experience as he was very aware of his father’s legacy and took extraordinary care and love to do justice to Frank’s creative genius.” The times he worked with Harry Connick, Jr. is equally incredible. He shares: “I am very proud of the work my brother and I did with Harry. Harry is a unique artist and to have been part of his two Emmy wins is something I am really proud of. To be able to observe and enable the right conditions for Harry to wield his magic was a great privilege.”
Leonard Cohen was another peek into greatness. “When Leonard passed, I got the opportunity to work with Adam Cohen on the tribute to his father. He assembled a great cast of artists ready to pay homage to Leonard. From Sting to k.d. lang, to Elvis Costello to Lana Del Rey to Damien Rice, to be able to produce, record, and mix these great songs performed by incredible artists imprinting their creative stamp on already incredible art offered insight into how creativity works but also how performance works.”
François’ transition into science through CXC™ only further emphasizes the importance of creativity in fields beyond art. “Science is art in another uniform,” he asserts. “The principles that drive artistic creativity—innovation, passion, vision—are the same principles that drive scientific discovery.”
François credits his own success to what he calls ‘purity of intent.’ His career, which spans decades, is marked by a deep commitment to creativity and an understanding of how to harness that creativity to serve a greater purpose. But despite his own achievements, working on Grammy and Emmy Award-winning projects, and even holding various patents such as an LCO patent for innovation in agricultural biostimulants, he maintains that luck, timing, and intent are the key ingredients that shape success.
It was this realization that led him to focus on helping scientists navigate the complex path of innovation, where many great ideas are stifled by lack of funding, institutional resistance, or simple fear of failure. He applies the same care and attention to these scientific endeavors as he does to his music projects—ensuring that ideas don’t stay hidden in the graveyard. They come to life.
All of this creativity and experiential knowledge is coalescing into CXC-SKIN, which is poised to transform the skincare landscape through the novel use of Chitosan and natural biopolymers.