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Maria João Pires

Biography (read more)

Maria João Pires was born on 23 July 1944 in Lisbon, Portugal, and was performing Mozart concertos in public by age seven. She studied at the Lisbon Conservatory under Campos Coelho and continued her training in Germany at the Munich Musikakademie with Rosl Schmid and in Hanover with Karl Engel. Her international breakthrough came in 1970 when she won the Beethoven Bicentennial Competition in Brussels.

Pires became renowned worldwide for her interpretations of Mozart, Beethoven, Chopin, and Schubert, performing with major orchestras across Europe, the Americas, Israel, and Japan, and winning a Gramophone Classical Music Award in 2015 for her Beethoven concerto recordings. She founded the Belgais Centre for the Study of the Arts in 1999, received the Pessoa Prize and the Praemium Imperiale (2024), and announced her retirement from performing in 2025 after health issues.

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Repertoire

Piano Concerto No. 20 in D minor, K. 466: I. Allegro— Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
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Impromptu Op. 142, No. 1 (Music Video)— Franz Schubert
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Piano Concerto No. 1 (Excerpt)— Frédéric Chopin
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Piano Concerto No. 20, K. 466: II. Romance (excerpt)— Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
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Piano Concerto No. 20 in D minor, K. 466: III. Rondo. Allegro assai (excerpt)— Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
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Piano Concerto No. 3 in C Minor, Op. 37: I. Allegro con brio— Composer not established
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Piano Concerto No. 3 in C Minor, Op. 37: II. Largo— Composer not established
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Piano Concerto No. 3 in C Minor, Op. 37: III. Rondo. Allegro— Composer not established
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Piano Concerto No. 4 in G Major, Op. 58: I. Allegro moderato— Composer not established
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Piano Concerto No. 4 in G Major, Op. 58: II. Andante con moto— Composer not established
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Piano Concerto No. 4 in G Major, Op. 58: III. Rondo: Vivace— Composer not established
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