Francisco Monteiro

Pianist Francisco Monteiro started his musical studies as a pupil Helena Costa’s in Porto – Portugal, entering later the local music conservatory where he achieved the Superior Piano Course with honour. He is graduated by the Musik Universität Wien – Austria (piano concert class by Noel Flores), the University of Coimbra – Portugal (Master Degree in Musicology) and the University of Sheffield (Ph.D. – Contemporary Music). He also studied analysis and composition with Cândido Lima, Álvaro Salazar (Porto) and Gottfried Scholtz (Vienna – Austria), conducting with Jean-Claude Hartemann and piano interpretation with Marie-Françoise Bucquet (Paris). He took part in several master classes with Vlado Perlemutter, Natalie Pepin, Anne Koscielny, Joseph Palenicek, Moura Castro and Jorg Demus among others. Awarded in national piano competitions, his activity as a pianist includes both solo and chamber presentations. Although is repertoire embraces works from the XVIII century until our days, he is mainly devoted to the 20th century and Portuguese music: he presented premières of works of C. Lima, J. Peixinho, A. Salazar, António Sousa Dias, Fernando Lapa, Christopher Bochmann, Terry W. Owens, Carlos Azevedo, Armando Santiago, Clotilde Rosa, Eurico Carrapatoso and Pedro Rocha. He took part in the Festivals of Udine, Transimeno Lake and Cagliary SpazioMusica (Italy), Essen Contemporary Music Festival (Germany), Bogotá Music Festival (Colombia), Valencia’s and Logroño’s Contemporary Music Festivals (Spain), Baku Music Festival (Romenia), Costa Verde Music Festival, Gulbenkian Contemporary Music Encounters, and the Music Festivals of Porto, Aveiro, Coimbra and Lisbon (Portugal). He also played solo in France, Austria, Italy, Belgium, U.S.A., Germany and in the U.K.. Francisco Monteiro recorded for the Portuguese national radio and television and the CDs "Exposed on the cliffs of the heart" - piano music of Terry Winter Owens and “Lov” – flute, cello and piano trio, playing music of Crumb, Piazolla, Azevedo and Peixinho. He also took part in many CDs concerning Portuguese contemporary music, with works of J. Peixinho, Clotilde Rosa, Christopher Bochmann, António Pinho Vargas, Álvaro Salazar and others. Together with is career as a performer he maintains a regular activity as a composer. His music is much influenced by the Western classical tradition and avant-garde composers of the sixties, and also by traditional Portuguese rural music and rock music. He is Professor in the Polytechnic Institute of Porto - Portugal (School of Education).

(text by Francisco Monteiro)

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Ana Ester Neves (soprano) and Francisco Monteiro (piano) perform Francisco Monteiro's "O Amor" (one of the "Three Alexandre O'Neill Songs").

Jorge Peixinho

Jorge Peixinho was a composer, pianist, teacher, critic, lecturer, international jury member, direction member of several organizations, concert organizer and conductor. His influence was crucial for the promotion of contemporary music in Portugal and Portuguese music abroad. He studied composition and piano at the National Conservatory of Lisbon. He was awarded a scholarship from the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation to study with Boris Porena and Goffredo Petrassi at the Accademia de Santa Cecilia in Rome, where he received the diploma of advanced studies in composition in 1961. After working with Luigi Nono in Venice he obtained another scholarship from the Gulbenkian Foundation and the Cultural Institute to study with Pierre Boulez and Karlheinz Stockhausen in Darmstadt on various occasions between 1960 and 1970. During this decade he developed a broad range of activities as a composer, pianist, teacher, concert organizer, lecturer and critic. A scholarship from the Belgian government for advanced studies in electro-acoustic music enabled him to work at the IPEM studio in Ghent in 1972-73. He later attended a workshop on music and computers at the Ircam, Paris. In 1970 he founded the Grupo de Música Contemporânea de Lisboa (Lisbon Contemporary Music Group) which has since done valuable service in promoting contemporary music (with a particular emphasis on Portuguese music) and no less in theoretical and practical exploration of the problematic of new music and of new instrumental techniques. In 1974 he received the composition prize of the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation and in 1976 that of the Portuguese performing rights society. In 1977 he was elected member of the Presidential Council of the ISCM (international Society for Contemporary Music). Throughout this period he collaborated regularity with the Gulbenkian Foundation's Contemporary Music Encounters. He taught at the National Conservatory of Lisbon. In recent years, before his untimely death at the age of 55, he was greatly in demand as a jury member and participant for both lectures and concerts. (adapted from text in PMIC)

My Space

Sérgio Azevedo

Photo: Carlos Mateus de Lima

Composer Sérgio Azevedo was born in Coimbra in 1968. He studied composition at the Academia de Amadores de Música (Lisbon) with composer Fernando Lopes-Graça and finished his studies of composition at the Escola Superior de Música de Lisboa, with Christopher Bochmann (a disciple of Nadia Boulanger) and Constança Capdeville. He followed several seminars at IRCAM and other institutions and worked in short periods with composers like Emmanuel Nunes (at the Gulbenkian Foundation), Tristan Murail, Phillipe Manoury, Jorge Peixinho, Louis Andriessen and Simon Bainbridge. He won several prizes of composition, in Portugal and abroad (like the United Nations Prize), and his works have been played and commissioned regularly in several countries (Spain, France, UK, Austria, Germany, Bulgaria, Brazil, Canada, USA, etc) by prestigious ensembles, soloists and conductors (Luca Pfaff, Pascal Roffé, Jürgen Bruns, Nikolai Lalov, Bruno Belthoise, Artur Pizarro, António Rosado, Miguel Borges Coelho, Anne Kaasa, Jose Ramon Encinar, Galliard Ensemble, Remix Ensemble, Nouvel Ensemble Moderne, Kammersymphonie Berlin, etc), some of them being available in commercial CDs. He works frequently with schools and students, composing a great deal of didactic pieces, ranging from piano solo to small ensembles and school orchestras. He’s also a prolific writer on music, with two books published, Inventing Sounds (Caminho 1999) and Olga Prats - Um Piano Singular (Bizâncio 2007) and several articles. He also contributes to the New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians and works for other prestigious magazines and CD labels. In 1993 he was appointed teacher of composition at the Escola Superior de Música de Lisboa. He was also author of broadcastings at RDP - Antena 2 since 1993 and member of the CESEM, Center for Aesthetic and Music Studies between 1993 and 2007. In 2007 he began his doctorate degree at Universidade do Minho with Elisa Lessa and Christopher Bochmann. His music is published by AVA - Editions (www.editions-ava.com). (adapted from text by Sérgio Azevedo)

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Other pages:

http://www.classical-composers.org/comp/azevedo
http://www.composers21.com/compdocs/azevedos.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S%C3%A9rgio_Azevedo

Pedro M. Rocha

Composer Pedro M. Rocha was born in Torres Novas in 1961. From 1981 to 1986 he studied music at the Lisbon National Conservatoire, with Gilberta Paiva and Olga Prats (piano), as well as composition with Jorge Peixinho, Álvaro Salazar and mainly Christopher Bochmann, under whom he graduated in 1990 at Lisbon Superior School of Music. From 1982 to 1990, he attended the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation’s Composition Seminaries with Emmanuel Nunes and then went to study microtonalism with Alain Bancquart, in Paris (Gulbenkian F. scholarship), where from 1992 to 1993 he attended a Composition and Computer course at the IRCAM. He also attended several workshops and seminaries about various subjects: Piano; Electroacoustic Music, Choir and Orchestra Conducting, Singing and Vocal Technique. His music includes orchestral pieces – with and without choir; a capella choir; chamber music often using pre-recorded sounds; pure acousmatic works, some with video. He is interested in the expansion of form and of musical parameters. Different works have different kinds of openness/ improvisation - “Dual”, “To a free world”, “To a world free from beliefs” – that contrast with totally closed ones like the acousmatic: “To a world free from religions”, “To a word free from countries”, “Composição I” and “Simbioses”. (text by Pedro M. Rocha)

Website

Eurico Carrapatoso

Photo by João Tuna

Portuguese composer Eurico Carrapatoso (b. 1962) graduated from Universidade in Porto with a degree in history in 1985. He taught social and economic history as an assistant professor at the Universidade Portucalense. In 1985 he began his musical studies with Borges Coelho, Fernando Lapa and Cândido Lima. In 1988, he began his composition studies with Constança Capdeville. His final studies were with Jorge Peixinho from 1991-93 at the Conservatório Nacional, where he graduated with highest honors. Carrapatoso has taught composition at the Escola Superior de Música and the Academia de Orquestra in Lisbon. Since 1989, he has taught Analysis and Techniques of Composition at the Conservatório Nacional in Lisbon. His works have been performed by most major ensembles and orchestras in Europe, Asia, Australia and Americas (Brazil, USA). He has won several awards, including the Lopes-Graça Prize (1998) and the Francisco de Lacerda Prize (1999); in addition, his works have represented Portugal three times at the UNESCO International Rostrum of Composers (Paris: 1998, 1999 and 2006). In May 2001 he won the Identidade Nacional Prize. In June 2004 he was decorated by the President of the Portuguese Republic with the Commendation of the Order of the Infante Dom Henrique. (text by Eurico Carrapatoso)

More detailed biographies: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eurico_Carrapatoso and
http://composers21.com/compdocs/carrapat.htm

Available discography

Eurico Carrapatoso's "Deploração sobre a morte de Jorge Peixinho" (5th mov. - "Paisagem Onírica com Anjos"), played by the Oporto National Orchestra, cond. Mark Foster:

also on You Tube:

http://br.youtube.com/watch?v=BxiaBwLLJE8
http://br.youtube.com/watch?v=YB3za18lfXk&feature=channel
http://br.youtube.com/watch?v=h4f3dkh0qdA&feature=channel
http://br.youtube.com/watch?v=vItALhNKwdA&feature=channel