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BIOGRAPHY

Raúl da Costa

portugal

Born in 1993, Raul da Costa started his musical studies at the age of seven in his hometown’s Music School, where he first studied piano with Professor Luis Amaro and then with Emília Coelho. From 2006 to 2011, he studied in Academia de Música S.Pio X in Vila do Conde, Portugal, with Professor Álvaro Teixeira Lopes. 

BIOGRAPHY

… his approach was full of fire and energy, beautifully under-pedalled with excellent phrasing and not overblown. For me Raúl is a true artist with a great future and not merely a pianist.

Michael Moran
critic of the International Chopin Competition in Warsaw and the International Paderewski Competition in Bydgoszcz

Raúl da Costa is a regular guest an the most prestigious halls in Portugal and in various Festivals throughout Europe. With a vast repertoire from Bach to Zimmermann, chamber music has represented a main point in Raúl’s career, specially the collaboration with Christoph Poppen, Juliane Banse, Bruno Monsaingeon and Matvey Demin. He made his orchestral debut at the age of 12 in Casa da Música, Porto, and has since then played under the baton of Stefan Blunier, Antonio Pirolli, Theodore Kuchar, Joseph Swensen, Martin Andre, Vladimir Lande and with various orchestras such as the Porto Symphony Orchestra, the Janacek Philharmonic Orchestra, the Siberian State Symphony Orchestra or the Antaliya Symphony Orchestra.

Raúl is the 1st Prize winner of the various international piano competitions, including the San Sebastian International Piano Competition, the Scriabin International Competition in Paris and in the Young Pianist of the North International Piano Competition in Newcastle.

He was a prizewinner of the 1st European Union Piano Competition in Prague (representing Portugal) with only 16 years of age.

In 2016, Raúl won the 1st Prize and unanimously the public prizes at the ZF Musikpreis International Award. Raúl is a scholar of the renowned Yamaha Music Foundation of Europe, the Yehudi Menuhin Live Music Now Foundation, and of the Gulbenkian Foundation in Lisbon.

He has made live recordings for both Portuguese and foreign Radio and Television, such as for the Deutschlandradio, NDR, SWR radios in Germany, or Radio France. His live recording of Rachmaninoff’s 4th Piano Concerto with Porto Symphony Orchestra and Stefan Blunier was released on CD.

Raúl profited of the work with distinguished artists such as Maria João Pires, Ferenc Rados, Dmitri Bashkirov, Ferenc Rados, Karl-Heinz Kämmerling, Boris Berezovsky, Roger Muraro and Tatiana Zelikman.

Raul studied in the Hochschule für Musik, Medien und Drama in Hannover, where he was part of the class of the renowned Professor Karl-Heinz Kämmerling and Prof. Bernd Goetzke. Currently, he is studying with Kirill Gerstein in the Hochschule für Musik Hanns Eisler, Berlin.

Raúl was appointed in 2018 Artistic Director of the Póvoa de Varzim International Music Festival.