Paulo Oliveira (b. 1979) is one of the most outstanding Portuguese pianists of his generation. Born in Vila do Conde, he began his musical studies at the age of nine with Joaquim Bento. He then joined the São Pio X Academy of Music on a scholarship from the Dr. Elias de Aguiar Foundation. At this institution, he studied with Margarida Almeida and Felipe Silvestre, having completed the Complementary Piano Course in 1998 with the highest grade. Later, he studied with Tania Achot, completing the Superior Piano Course at the Lisbon Superior School of Music, again with the highest ratings.
He continued his training with Sequeira Costa at the University of Kansas, with whom he studied for nearly a decade, thus inheriting the most faithful knowledge of the golden age of piano, which his master had received directly from Vianna da Motta, Mark Hamburg, Edwin Fischer, Marguerite Long and Jacques Février. He completed his master’s studies at this university in 2005, with a scholarship from the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation. Later, in 2009, he concluded his doctorate with distinction with a scholarship from the Foundation for Science and Technology. Other relevant teachers in his training were Helena Sá e Costa, Luiz de Moura Castro, Andrei Diev, Vladimir Viardo, Vitaly Margulis, Aldo Ciccolini, Paul Badura-Skoda and Dmitri Bashkirov.
He was distinguished with several prizes in national and international competitions, highlighting the prize he won at the Vianna da Motta International Piano Competition, 1st Prize at the Bartók-Kabalevsky-Prokofiev International Competition, and 2nd Prize at the Interpretation Competition do Estoril / El Corte Inglés Award and 1st Prize at the Young Pianists Festival 2010 / Chopin Award organized by Orquestra Metropolitana de Lisboa. He was also the winner of the Kansas University Symphony Orchestra Concerto Competition. The duo he has with cellist Teresa Valente Pereira won an award at a recital held at the Palau de la Música Catalan, in Barcelona. He has performed solo, with an orchestra and in chamber music in Portugal, Spain, Andorra, Italy, France, United Kingdom, Poland, Brazil and the United States of America. He recorded for RDP Antena 2, Radio France and Catalunya Ràdio. He played solo with the University of Kansas Symphony Orchestra, the Espinho Classical Orchestra, the Algarve Orchestra, the North Orchestra, the Lisbon Metropolitan Orchestra and the Portuguese Symphony Orchestra, under the direction of conductors Nicholas Uljanov, Steven McDonald, Pedro Neves, Ferreira Lobo, Cesário Costa and Daniel Klajner.
Paulo Oliveira reconciles his concert activity with teaching. He was professor of piano at the National Conservatory and at the Piaget Institute. Currently, he is part of the faculty of the Academy of Music of Santa Cecília and the Superior National Academy of Orchestra / Metropolitana. He has been regularly invited to conduct masterclasses at home and abroad, and has been a member of international piano competition juries on several occasions.
He is a founding member of the current Portuguese delegation of the EPTA – European Piano Teachers Association.