Biography

The music, the interpreter, the instrument – this is the ranking of priorities orienting my work as an artist and a teacher - my musical heritage to which I add 40 years of reflection and teaching.

The performer's task is to interpret a piece of music. However, this process of recreation requires a profound respect of the work and its author. The challenge is to strike a balance between the original message and the artistic expression of the performer.

Working with music means a constant strive for enriching one's own personality on all levels, artistic and human.

This is the aim of my work.

— Manuela Gouveia, 2010

First concert with orchestra at the age of 12.
Left-to-right: Manuela's Grandfather, Manuela's Mother, Helena de Sá Costa, Manuela, Maestro Silva Pereira

Manuela Gouveia was born in Oporto (Portugal). Having undergone an education strongly characterized by a family environment where music occupied a privileged position, since very early she showed her talent for music, having given her first piano recital at the age of 5.

The basis of her musical training are the philosophical and pedagogical principles of Edgar Willems who took her as a pupil in order to demonstrate and introduce his "Method of musical introduction" in Portugal, at the beginning of the 50ies. From those days she also keeps the memories of listening to the trios and quartets of Haydn, Beethoven and Mozart performed in her paternal house, where chamber music was regularly performed. At that time she took up music and piano classes with Portugal's most renowned pianist and teacher of that time, Helena de Sá Costa, who - exceptionally - accepted her as a pupil at the age of 5.

At the age of 12, she played for the first time with the Symphony orchestra of Oporto, her birthplace, under the conductor Silva Pereira.
She obtained numerous First Prizes of piano at competitions of the Musical Youth and the Second International Prize of Young Musicians in Palma de Mallorca, at the age of 16.

In 1965, she obtained the Diploma of the higher Piano Course in the class of Professor Helena de Sá Costa at the Oporto Music Conservatory.

At the same time and at the same Conservatory, she attended composition classes, obtaining the Diploma of Composition in the class of Prof. Luís Filipe Pires - one of the most remarkable current Portuguese composers.

Between 1967 e 1972, she attended the course of the German pianist and pedagogue Prof. Conrad Hansen, at the Staatliche Hochschule für Musik Hamburg (Germany) where she obtained her Diploma as a concert pianist.

Through Helena de Sá Costa and Conrad Hansen, both former pupils of Edwin Fischer, Manuela Gouveia received the heritage of the School of the great pianists of the beginning of the XX. century. Thus she started to appreciate and know profoundly the work of J.S. Bach and L. v. Beethoven.

At the same time, she began her activity as a concert pianist. Throughout her career she gave innumerable concerts and recitals – as a soloist and with orchestra – in Portugal and abroad and made numerous recordings for Radio and Television.

Manuela during a press interview in 1981

She attended interpretation courses with Karl Engel, Alfred Brendel, Jörg Demus, Paul Badura-Skoda, Vlado Perlemuter and Wilhelm Kempff, personalities who have marked her profoundly.

Manuela Gouveia is a laureate of numerous national and international competitions, among which the Palma de Mallorca International Competition, the "Guilhermina Suggia" Competition of Lisbon, the Luso-Spanish Competition of Oporto and the Luso-Brazilian Competition of Covilhã (Portugal).

She played with orchestra in Portugal and in Europe under the conductors Silva Pereira, Manuel Ivo Cruz, Álvaro Cassuto, Gunther Arglebe, A. Salazar, Ferreira Lobo, Marcel Dautremer, Henri Arends, E. Van Remoortel, Nicholas Harsanyi, Ulisses Waterlot, Jean Marc Burfin and Rudolf Baumgartner. Among those performances, her interpretation of the concerts of Bach and Mozart with the chamber orchestras "Festival Strings" and "Waterloo" under the conductors Rudolf Baumgartner and Ulisses Waterlot deserve a special mention.

She has a very broad repertory as a soloist and with orchestra – consisting of works ranging from the baroque to the contemporary.

She performs regularly with chamber music groupings, having played in duo and trio with, among others, Madalena Costa, Paulo Gaio Lima, Dominique Williencourt, Christoph Henkel, Jan Neven, Márcio Carneiro (violoncello), Gerardo Ribeiro (violine), Oliveira Lopes, Maria Mateu Palau, Margarida Natividade (voice).

In her recitals she regularly performs works of Portuguese composers she has come to know personally, such as Cláudio Carneyro, Macedo Pinto, Jorge Croner of Vasconcellos, Armando Fernandes, Lopes Graça, Luís Costa, Filipe Pires and Cândido Lima. Several of these composers dedicated some of their works for piano to Manuela Gouveia.

For her personal efforts in making Portuguese music and culture known to a wider international public, in 1993 Manuela Gouveia has been awarded the Medal of Merit of the Portuguese Government.

Among her recordings on CD various works of Portuguese composers have been published as a world premiere.

As a Portuguese interpreter, she represented her country abroad on the occasion of several international events like the World Exhibition in Seville in 1992, the celebration of Portugal's accession to the European Union and at the Beethoven Festival in Bonn (Germany).

Manuela Gouveia is regularly invited to play at Festivals - in Portugal, Belgium, Germany, France and Italy - and to give masterclasses for which she is specially appreciated. Among the Festivals and masterclasses particular mention has to be made of the "International Piano Festival and Masterclasses of Óbidos – SIPO" in Portugal, founded by Manuela Gouveia in 1996.

She has been professor for piano at the Escola Superior de Música do Porto (Portugal), teacher at the Bonn Music Conservatory (Germany) and has now a professorship at the Escola Superior de Música de Catalunya in Barcelona (Spain).