Cesário Costa

Cesário Costa has distinguished himself as one of the most active Portuguese conductors of his generation. After completing a degree in piano performance in Paris, he went on to study orchestral conducting, completing his Licentiate and Master’s degrees at the Würzburg School of Music (Germany). He recently obtained his PhD from the Universidade Nova de Lisboa, with the thesis ‘Noble et Sentimental: Pedro de Freitas Branco e a problemática da interpretação na música de Maurice Ravel’ (Noble and Sentimental: Pedro de Freitas Branco and the problem of interpretation in the music of Maurice Ravel). In 1997, he received a scholarship from the Bayreuth Music Festival and won the 3rd Fundação Oriente International Competition for Young Orchestra Conductors. Since then, he has been invited to conduct numerous national and international groups. His repertoire ranges from the Baroque to the contemporary, including more than one hundred and thirty works in their absolute premiere. As well as conducting orchestras, he has taught and programmed music at various institutions. He was President of Metropolitana/Associação Música, Educação e Cultura, the organisation that manages the Lisbon Metropolitan Orchestra (of which he was also Artistic Director), Artistic Director and Principal Conductor of the Algarve Orchestra, Orquestra Clássica do Sul, Orquestra Clássica de Espinho, Musicare Chamber Orchestra and Principal Conductor of OrchestrUtópica. At the same time, he taught at various schools and was a professor at the Portuguese Catholic University. He is an integrated researcher at CESEM (FCSH-UNL), Artistic Director of the Promenade Concerts at the Coliseu do Porto, Artistic Director of In Spiritum – Porto Music Festival, Principal Conductor and Artistic Director of the Orquestra Sinfónica Ensemble, Principal Conductor and Artistic Director of the Orquestra Bomtempo and Principal Conductor and Artistic Director of the Orquestra Municipal de Sintra – D. Fernando II.