Pedro Burmester / Portuguese Pianist

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"He has a strong personality, imposes himself on the audiences, has an astonishing creativity in his interpretation and a perfect technical quality. His intelligence and culture are immediately noticed." (Alfred Brendel)

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The Potuguese pianist, Pedro Burmester (Born: 1963 - Porto, Portugal), studied for 10 years with Helena Costa, and finished in 1981 his piano studiees at the Conservatório do Porto with maximum classification. Later, he moved to the USA, having worked there, between 1983 and 1987, with Sequeira Costa, Leon Fleisher and Dmitry Paperno. In addition, he attended the master-classes of Jörg Demus, Aldo Ciccolini, Karl Engel, Vladimir Ashkenazy, Tatiana Nikolayeva and Elisabeth Leonskaja. In 1983, he won 2nd prize of the International Piano Competition "Vianna da Mota" in Lisbon. He was awarded the Jury Discretionary Award of the 1989 Van Cliburn Competition, and he was prize winner of several national piano competitions, such as Prix de Sá Moreira.

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Pedro Burmester started his concert activity at 10 years old and since then has held over 500 concerts, a solo, with orchestra and in co-operation with various chamber music ensembles in Portugal and abroad. Besides being invited to perform in all Portuguese festivals, he has played in France's main Festivals (such as Le Roque d'Anthéron), in Festivals in Italy, at the Belfast Festival, the Klavierfestival Ruhr, the Sommerliche Musiktage Hitzacker, both the Flanders Festival and the Wallonie Festival in Belgium. He went on tour in France, Germany, Belgium, Holland, Poland, the USA, Canada, Japan (with the Metropolitan Orchestra), Australia (1997-1998 with the Australian Chamber Orchestra), South Africa, Latin America (Brazil). Some of the prestigious halls and series who have invited Pedro Burmester include the 92nd Y-series and the Frick Collection in New York, the Salle Gaveau and Châtelet in Paris, the Kölner Philharmonie, the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, De Doelen in Rotterdam, the Gewandhaus in Leipzig, the Beethoven-Haus in Bonn, as well as various German radio stations including Radio Bremen and WDR-Köln.

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Pedro Burmester has collaborated with renowned conductors, as Manuel Ivo Cruz, Miguel Graça Moura, Alvaro Cassuto, Omri Hadar, Gabriel Chmura, Muhai Tang, Lothar Zagrosek, Michael Zilma, Frans Brüggen and Georg Solti. He has performed with many well-known orchestras, such as the National Opera Orchestra Belgium, Northern Sinfonia of England, Nederlands Kamerorkest, Gulbenkian Orchestra, Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra, the Australian Chamber Orchestra to name a few. He was invited by Sir Georg Solti to perform Beethoven's Piano Concerto No. 5 with the London Symphony Orchestra at the opening concert of "Lisbon, Cultural Capital of Europe '94".

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Pedro Burmester is also very much at ease in chamber music. For 10 years he maintains a duo with pianist Mario Laginha. A among his partners we find the violinists Gerardo Ribeiro and Thomas Zehetmair, the cellists Anner Bylsma, Mischa Maisky and Paulo Gaio Lima, the clarinetist António Saiote, and the Prazak Quartet. Recently he formed a group of piano and percussions that has appeared with great success in several festivals and concerts in Portugal. With Anner Bylsma he has toured Belgium (Flanders Festival, Philharmonic Society Brussels), Holland (the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam), France and Austria (Linz, Innsbruck).

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Recently, Pedro Burmester played, amongst others, at the prestigious Wigmore Hall in London, the Gulbenkian, the Folles Journées Bach in Nantes and again in La Roque d’Anthéron and recorded the Robert Schumann concerto after playing it in various cities in Portugal. Another project for BMG/RCA, is the recording in 1999 of the complete Beethoven Violin & piano Sonatas, which he presented in concert and recording with Gerardo Ribeiro. His discography includes also CD's with the works of J. Bach, Schumann, Schubert and Chopin, a duo disc with Mario Laginha and recordings with the Orquestra Metropolitana de Lisboa (Metropolitan Orchestra of Lisbon).

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Upcoming projects include, chamber music tours with clarinet, percussion, recitals in various European countries. Apart from his concert-work, Pedro Burmester is at the head of the commission responsible for the programming at the newly “Casa de Musica”-building, which was one of the projects for “Porto, European Capital of Culture 2001”. Since 1991, he is Professor at the Escola Superior de Música e Artes do Espectáculo do Porto.

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