I work as associate professor of philosophy and aesthetics at the Rudolf Steiner University College, Oslo, and as a pianist, focusing on classical and contemporary music.
As a pianist, I have given concerts in Scandinavia, Great Britain and Germany as soloist, chamber-musician and accompanist, performing amongst others at Borealis festival, Spor festival, New Music’s Oslo Chamber-music festival and Weimar Neue Musikfesttage. My repertoar includes contemporary and classical music as well as some of my own material as part of the duo Kōan with Juhani Silvola. I have played with several ensembles (Chamber-chameleons, asamisimasa, NeoN) and performed regularly with Silvia Moi. I studied piano with prof. Jiri Hlinka and prof. Håvard Gimse in Oslo, and prof. Heide Görtz in Berlin.
My work with meditation, contemplative and spiritual research and practices is based in the works of Rudolf Steiner and Yeshayahu Ben-Aharon, with whom I have studied for many years, since 2010 also as part of the Global Event College. The collaboration with Ben-Aharon resulted in the Art&Event festival which I co-founded with him and organized as part of GEC between 2011 and 2016.
I studied philosophy (MA) at Centre for Research in Modern European Philosophy in London where I focused on Deleuze and Heidegger. I wrote my PhD on transcendental empiricism and music at the Norwegian Academy of Music under the guidance of Éric Alliez (University of Paris 8) and Erling E. Guldbrandsen (University of Oslo). In addition to my research I am co-running the independent printing press Dynamis.
I live on a peninsula outside Oslo with my wife and two daughters.
You can reach me at torbjorn.eftestol @ gmail.com
The wondrous music of becoming 