Rafael Toral

Rafael Toral is a musician and sound engineer also active in visual arts. Born in Lisbon, Portugal in 1967, he has been performing live since 1984. Having attempted to study music, he realized his path was one of exploration and discovery, to which conventional music teaching was irrelevant. Considered by the Chicago Reader to be "one of the most gifted and innovative guitarists of the decade", his work focuses mainly on the possibilities of ambient music (variable attention listening process), the electric guitar as a sound generator and improvisation with higher levels of risk (using instruments or systems that behave in unpredictable ways). Exploring relations between sound phenomena such as resonance or difference tones and the human capacity for creative listening, Toral has developed a sound world weaving a unique blend of references such as ambient, rock, chance and improvisation. He recorded several solo CDs, two with the MIMEO electronic orchestra and two with No Noise Reduction (see discography), an experimental project with long time friend and collaborator Paulo Feliciano. Toral performed extensively throughout Europe, Japan and North America, mostly solo but having as well collaborated with Sei Miguel, Phill Niblock, Rhys Chatham, John Zorn, Thurston Moore, Dean Roberts, Christian Fennesz, John Tilbury and Jim O'Rourke. He has also produced rock bands (Pop dell'Arte, Tina and the Top Ten, Supernova, Toast, Clockwork), presented video and multimedia installations and performed music of Phill Niblock and John Cage. His installations usually have an interactive and unpredictable behavior, often using processing of generative feedback systems, such as "Toyzone" (a piece with modified electronic toys, custom relay circuits and multiple sensors), the mixed-media installation produced in collaboration with Paulo Feliciano for "Sonic Boom - the Art of Sound", at the Hayward Gallery in London, 2000, or "Echo Room", a piece for delayed feedback random sound filtering, recently at the ICC in Tokyo.