Alexandre Delgado

Alexandre Delgado (Lisbon, 1965) was a private student of Joly Braga Santos in composition between 1981 and 1985. He continued his studies with Jacques Charpentier in France and graduated with the 1st Prize in Composition from the Conservatoire of Nice in 1990, as a scholarship holder of the SEC (Secretariat of State for Culture). His career was propelled by the international success of his opera O Doido e a Morte (The Madman and Death, 1994), which he conducted at the Teatro Nacional de São Carlos in Lisbon, at the Theater am Halleschen Ufer in Berlin, at Theatro da Paz in Belém do Pará, and at Sala Cecília Meirelles in Rio de Janeiro. This was followed by A Rainha Louca (The Mad Queen, 2006-09), of which he conducted productions in Portugal and Brazil. His third opera, Felizmente Há Luar (Fortunately There is Moonlight, 2024), was composed to celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of the revolution of 25 April 1974 and toured the country in a total of ten performances, being considered by the American magazine Opera Wire as “perhaps the most important new work to emerge this year.” Among his vast instrumental and vocal output, published by AVA Editions, are works that have become repertoire pieces internationally, such as Langará for clarinet and The Panic Flirt for flute, as well as several cantatas for children’s and youth choirs and orchestras, which he conducted at the Centro Cultural de Belém, Teatro Tivoli, Teatro Nacional de São Carlos, and Casa da Música.

As an instrumentalist, he studied violin at FMAC (School of Music of the Armed Forces) and was a student of Barbara Friedhoff in viola, graduated in France, and won the 1st edition of the Prémio Jovens Músicos (Young Musicians Prize) in 1987. He premiered his Concerto for Viola and Orchestra as a soloist in Portugal, Spain, and the Netherlands. He was a member of the European Union Youth Orchestra (EUYO), the Gulbenkian Orchestra, the Lacerda Quartet, and the Moscow Piano Quartet.

He was a music critic for the newspaper Público (between 1991 and 2001) and artistic director of Cistermúsica / Alcobaça Music Festival (from 2002 to 2019). Since 1996, he has been the host of the programme A Propósito de Música on RTP Antena 2, one of the longest-running programmes on Portuguese radio. He is the author of the books A Sinfonia em Portugal, A Culpa é do Maestro, and Luís de Freitas Branco, published by Editorial Caminho.

Regularly invited as a lecturer and concert commentator, Alexandre Delgado pursues a freelance career devoted mainly to composition.