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Conductor and teacher, Vasco Pearce de Azevedo is Principal Conductor and Music Director of the Lisbon Sinfonietta, an orchestra which he founded in 1995. With this orchestra, he has conducted concerts in several places of Portugal, many of which have featured world premières of pieces written especially for the Lisbon Sinfonietta. Mr. Azevedo’s career as a conductor has been developping especially after he was awarded a 3rd Prize in the IIIº Maestro Pedro de Freitas Branco International Conductors Competition (Lisbon, 1997) and a Honourable Mention in the II° Fundação Oriente International Competition for Young Conductors (Lisbon, 1996). Since then he keeps receiving invitations to conduct all of the top Portuguese orchestras such as the Portuguese Symphony Orchestra, the Lisbon Metropolitan Orchestra, the National Oporto Orchestra, the Beiras Philharmonia, the Algarve Orchestra and the Symphony Youth Orchestra. He has also been invited by the National Ballet Company to conduct several series of shows featuring Prokofiev’s "Cinderella", Stravinski’s "Agon" (Portugal première) and "Apollon Musagète", Lopes-Graça’s "Dançares" (World première), and Tchaikovski’s "The Sleeping Beauty". Mr. Azevedo made his debut at the S. Carlos National Opera in February 1999 when he was invited to conduct the revival of the opera "La Borghesina" by Portuguese composer Augusto Machado, a piece that had not been heard again since its première in 1909.
Vasco Pearce de Azevedo earned a Bachelor Degree in Composition from the Lisbon Superior School of Music where he studied with Christopher Bochmann and Constança Capdeville, and a Master’s Degree in Orchestral and Choral Conducting from the University of Cincinnati, College-Conservatory of Music (CCM), where he studied with Gerhard Samuel and Christopher Zimmermann (Orchestral Conducting); and also with Elmer Thomas and John Leman (Choral Conducting). He also attended several Conducting Masterclasses in Spain, France, Belgium, and Portugal, where he studied with Jean-Sébastien Béreau, Ernst Schelle, Jenö Rehak, and Octav Calleya (Orchestral Conducting); and also with Erwin List, Josep Prats, Edgar Saramago, and José Robert (Choral Conducting).
Apart from his conducting activities, he is presently the Head of the Conducting Department at the Lisbon Superior School of Music, as well as Principal Conductor of this school’s Orchestra and Chamber Choir. He has been the Music Director and Principal Conducting Teacher of the Aveiro Orchestral Conducting Masterclasses (held yearly in Aveiro in mid-July) since the creation of these courses in 2002.