Montreal-based musician Ida Toninato has an ear for the unknown and a deep interest in sonic phenomenons. She explores and bonds with reverberant spaces, with which she creates most of her music. A solid contemporary music background and her own daring intuitions are the two pillars of her composition practice. After Strangeness is Gratitude, her debut full length record available on Kohlenstoff records, she recorded We Become Giants at the Tank Center for Sonic Arts (Colorado) and released it on Dragon’s eye Recordings. Inspired by the 40 seconds reverb of this giant metal water tank, and infused with electronic processing in studio, this album has been described as “a marvel of technique and emotion, of patience and careful post-production, combining long near-silences with beautiful and terrifying reverberant tones that multiply in fractal form, each detail as rich and intense as its source” [Exclaim].

Ida Toninato performs with viola d’amore player and singer-songwriter Jennifer Thiessen with whom she recorded The Space Between Us, their JUNO-nominated album. Another of her collaboration involves laptop musician and spatialist Ana Dall’Ara-Majek. Together they form the duo Jane/KIN, mixing improvisation and full-dome spatialisation. Their A/V creation IisIIIIisIIIIIIIIII, using heartbeat sensors plugged to members of the audience, was premiered at the Society forTechnological Arts in Montreal and part of the first Dome World Tour. 

She develops her work in residencies across the globe, from Brazil (Goethe Institut, Salvador de Bahia) to Germany (Hellerau center for the arts) and is, at the moment, focused on new compositions for electric guitar quartet and improvisers ensemble.

Portrait: Hugo Saint-Laurent