Musicatlas
Music
Life
Filipe de Sousa studied at the National Conservatoire of Lisbon, where he graduated in Piano (with Abreu Mota) and Composition (with Jorge Croner de Vasconcellos). At the same time, he took a degree in Classical Philology at the University of Lisbon. In 1957, he won his conductor’s diploma at the Staatsakademie in Vienna under Hans Swarowsky with the help of a grant that enabled him also to study in Munich with Adolph Mennerich and F. Lehmann and in Hilversum with Albert Wolf. Apart from his activities as a pianist — which include many first performances in Portugal of works by Béla Bartók, Paul Hindemith, Igor Stravinsky, Arnold Schoenberg, Alban Berg, Darius Milhaud and others — and as a composer — with works like the Dance Suite, for orchestra (1954), the Sinfonieta (1956), and many works for voice and piano — Filipe de Sousa, who has also conducted in Portugal and abroad, has taken upon himself an important mission: the systematic research of old Portuguese music leading to the recovery of several masterpieces whose whereabouts were unknown. His classical education and literary culture are determining factors in his personality as an artist.