Rafael Anton Irisarri


Rafael Anton Irisarri is an American composer, multi-instrumentalist, producer and media artist based in Seattle, Washington. He is predominantly associated with post-minimalist, drone and electronic music, exploring textural aesthetics for over half a decade. His pointillist compositions lean towards ostinato motifs that tap into minimalist ideals while his studio production style is characterized by dense layers of reverb and delay, suggesting a blurred cinematic quality, like half-remembered dreams full of elegiac beauty. Bowed guitar textures, deep pulsing bass tones, field recordings, submerged piano notes, melancholic strings and subtle electronic counterpoints all contribute and converge equally in his music to create an oceanic experience that contrasts the epic and subdued, "like an ambient symphony recording that’s been rescued from attic entombment after half a century."
His compositions were once described by The Wire contributing writer Jefferson Petrey as "a dual perspective close-up focus on the micro textures of rustling static-filled sonic surfaces with the wide-open distant tree lined horizons of sunset at dusk." PopMatters depicted his music as "sensual, propulsive, and shrouded in mercurial darkness" while Drowned in Sound chronicled "his ear for a soul-crushing melody continues to shine through the album's dense caverns of reverb". Chris Brosman from online tastemaker Pitchfork referred to his production work as "a beautifully bleak cloud of sound", while music journalist Patric Fallon praised his compositions as "dense, panoramic soundscapes".
Irisarri is also known as the main member of electronic music/shoegaze act The Sight Below, and signed to American label Ghostly International.

Influences

Irisarri cited in an interview with German magazine De:Bug as having been inspired by classical composers like Mahler, Satie, Debussy, and Wagner, and contemporary musicians like Kevin Shields, Robin Guthrie, and Harold Budd. He also cites French existentialist philosopher Albert Camus and Uruguayan short story writer Horacio Quiroga as influences, and lists Le Petit Prince by Antoine de Saint Exupéry as one of his all-time favorite books. He considers filmmakers David Lynch, Jan Švankmajer, Werner Herzog, and Julio Medem as continuous sources of inspiration. In a radio interview with the ABC in Sydney, Irisarri goes into further detail, describing to Quiet Space radio host Paul Gough the process behind The North Bend as inspired by "this region, and not just with the fairly obvious 'rainy, gloomy skies' clichés, but more in the folk, cultural traditions and pop-culture references. They sort of helped me create an audio postcard of this beautiful area of the United States."
on the Puget Sound in March 2010.

Live performances

Irisarri travels frequently to perform live throughout Europe, North America, Australia and the Middle East. Highlights include concerts at Barcelona's Sónar, Detroit's DEMF, Montreal's MUTEK, and Krakow's Unsound. Aside from electronic music festivals, Irisarri has presented his works at multidisciplinary arts events, including Milan's prestigious MITO SettembreMusica festival and Israel Festival in Jerusalem.
His live performances are mostly centered around the piano, electric guitar and laptop, with Irisarri manipulating the sonic timbre of his instruments using different complex DSP patches and routings through his notebook computer, effect pedals and multichannel mixer. He utilizes real-time signal processing, chaining together a series of custom-made looping software to achieve the textural density of his recorded works and favors all improvised performances, earning him recognition from peers like Pantha Du Prince.
, Poland October 24, 2008
In December 2010, Irisarri released, through his Bandcamp store, a collection of live recordings performed at selected cities worldwide.

Collaborations

In the studio, Irisarri has worked extensively with Simon Scott, Tiny Vipers, Benoît Pioulard, Goldmund and remixed School of Seven Bells, Balmorhea, Detroit's Echospace, and Germany's Pantha Du Prince.
Live, he has collaborated with Australian artist and Room40 label curator Lawrence English, Portland's Grouper, and Italian electro-acoustic composer Andrea Belfi.
In 2010, Irisarri collaborated twice with renowned Austrian guitarist Fennesz, performing together live at Interferenze Festival in Italy and later at Decibel Festival in Seattle.
In May 2010, Irisarri traveled to Jerusalem to collaborate with Koen Holtkamp, Greg Davis, Ido Govrin, Ran Slavin and Yair Etziony in a two-day audiovisual performance piece titled Dissolving Localities, which explored the city's diverse cultures and unique sights and sounds. The project was commissioned as part of Israel Festival.
On January 21, 2011, Irisarri and Benoît Pioulard released a cover version of Broadcast's "Until Then", as a tribute to Trish Keenan. Later that year, the collaboration spawned into a full, new project, called Orcas. Their debut album was released in April 2012 on Morr Music.
As a media artist, Irisarri has prepared, created and performed live video for Fennesz, Lusine, Simon Scott, Solvent, and The Sight Below.

Discography

Studio albums
Studio mini-LP
Studio EPs
Compilations
Remixes
Guest appearances