I was born in Funchal, MadeiraIsland, on August 21st 1986, where I lived until my 19th birthday. I grew up to the sound of my older brother’s music, who inspired me and with whom I learned how to play the guitar. Soon I realized music should be my destiny, but due to life’s uncertainties and my early age’s doubts, it was only in 2005 I joined a Jazz course at the Madeira Conservatorium.
A year later, greatly motivated, I moved to Lisbon to join Luiz Villas-Boas Jazz School – Hot Club of Portugal. Here, I met a large number of colleagues with whom to play and exchange ideas, as well as experienced teachers who taught me to the highest degree.
Two years later, a greatly anticipated Jazz bachelor debuted at Lisbon’s School of Music (Escola Superior de Música de Lisboa) and I managed to enrol it in its very first year. The degree lasted for 3 years and during that time I met a large number of great musicians, most of whom I have a chance to play nowadays.
Since the beginning of my studies I took part in numerous workshops and masterclasses, all truly important for me as a musician. However, I have to emphasize a few which really set a mark like the one with André Fernandes’s group and Akiko Pavolka’s group, in 2005 at Funchal; the Lisbon Jazz Summer School 2010 with Danilo Pérez Quintet; and Begues Jazz Camp 2012 with Jordi Rossy, Peter Bernstein, Joe Martin, Bill McHenry and Bruce Barth;
I also structured a few masterclasses, such as the ones with musicians John Taylor, Lee Konitz, Dan Weiss/Ohad Talmor and Peter Bernstein.
Having obtained my degree in 2010, I have become a teacher at the very same school that welcomed me in Lisbon, Luiz Villas-Boas Jazz School – Hot Club of Portugal.
In 2011, I won two awards in two distinct competitions. First, the “Best Band Prize” with the André Carvalho Quintet, at the Bucharest Jazz Competition; and second, the 1st place in the Jazz Combo category of the 25th edition of the Prémio Jovens Músicos, with the Ricardo Toscano Quartet.
It was also in 2011 that I was told that the famous Portuguese singer Teresa Salgueiro was auditioning for a guitar player in her own group, with whom she would be recording her debut album as a lead singer. I auditioned and got chosen. Between March 2011 until March 2013 I recorded and toured with Teresa around the world from Mexico to Macao, passing by Italy, Spain, Poland, Sweden, Serbia, Montenegro & Slovenia.
Meanwhile, I also recorded and toured with the band L.A. New Mainstream, from the great german composer/arranger/trombonist Lars Arens. A very challenging setting along with great musicians and unique repertoire.
In April of 2013 I had the opportunity to play with the amazing singer Sara Serpa at the Festa do Jazz do São Luiz and with the one and only Orquestra de Jazz de Matosinhos featuring Ohad Talmor and Julien Arguelles and their compositions.
2013 was a great year. It was the year that I published my first album ‘Ponto de Partida’, with 9 original tunes featuring Ricardo Toscano on alto saxophone, Joao Hasselberg on double bass and Joao Pereira on drums, as well as three special guests: Gianni Gagliardi on tenor saxophone, Joana Espadinha and Margarida Campelo on voice. Besides that, I also recorded with Antonio Quintino, his debut album ‘Prologo’ and had the opportunity to play with very inspiring bands such as Demian Cabaud ‘Benespera’ and Jeff Davis/Marc Miralta Quartet.
In 2014, my main goal was to promote my debut album but I also intended to record a new one, the Mano a Mano project, along with my brothe r Bruno. We’ve recorded in our hometown in April and the album was released in December. I was very happy to finally record with my brother the first of many albums!As a sidemen, it was in 2014 that I played for the first time in Paris, with musicians such as Lionel Boccara, Yoni Zelnik, Vincent Frade and Viktor Nyberg. One month later, I was invited to play with the Steffen Schorn ‘Universe of Possibilities’ ensemble in the Festa do Jazz do São Luiz.
In the meantime I felt like I needed to shake things up and focus even more on my music so I decided to take the Jazz Master in the Conservatorium van Amsterdam, so after succeeded in the admission exam I moved to Amsterdam in September 2014.
During this period I met a lot of new people and I formed my new band, a trio with the double bassist Matt Adomeit and the drummer Tristan Renfrow.
From September to May 2015, this band was my main focus and I wrote some new music with this powerful and unpredictable rhythm section in mind and scheduled a Portuguese tour, plus a couple of concerts in Amsterdam, being the one at the Bimhuis in the Rough Diamonds Series a very special one. In the meantime some projects back in Portugal were keep going and in March 2015 I did the last concert of my previous CD ‘Ponto de Partida’ in Festa do Jazz do São Luiz 2015 and my fellow friend Gonçalo Marques released his CD ‘Cabeça de nuvem só tem coração’, which we recorded back in the summer of 2014.
In September 2015 I moved to Philadelphia due to an exchange program between Conservatorium van Amsterdam and Temple University, I stayed there until December 2015 and I spent the four months between Philadelphia and New York, taking advantage of this opportunity to know botch cities as well as possible, check as many concerts as I could, taking lessons and doing concerts. During this time I played in a few venues such as Chris’ Jazz Cafe; The Shrine; The Bar Next Door; Silvana; Club Bonafide and Rockwood Music Hall with musicians such as Vinnie Sperrazza; André Carvalho; Chris Cheek; Peter Brendler; Rogerio Boccato; Gianni Gagliardi; Pablo Menares and Jesse Simpson.
In January 2016, I got back to Amsterdam, to finish my master degree. First of all, I finished and presented my master research ‘CHORDOPHONIA: a new repertoire for braguinha, rajão and viola d’arame’ about these three string instruments from my hometown, Madeira. Then I started thinking and preparing my final concert, scheduled for May 9th, where I played two small showcases, one with Mano a Mano (with my brother Bruno) and another one with my trio feat. Tristan Renfrow on drums and Matt Adomeit on double bass. It went pretty well and I finished my Master’s with a grade 9 out of 10.
In the meantime, I recorded in February 2016 a new record by Lars Arens, a big band record featuring his unique repertoire. I’m always glad to be challenged by Lars’s music and I’m very looking forward to listen to the final result!
I also recorded my second album ‘Vitamina D’ with Tristan and Matt by the end of April, taking advantage of the 6 recording hours every master student has in the Conservatorium van Amsterdam’s studio. We did 7 original tunes of mine and kept working on the post production after my return to Portugal in May 2016 until the releasing date in August 25th, by Robalo music.
In the meanwhile, in between a busy summer in Madeira and Lisbon, I got chosen to be part in the Mediterranean Youth Orchestra of the Festival d’Aix en Provence, in July. Here I got the chance to work with Raphael Imbert and meet 12 musicians from countries all over the Mediterranean such as Syria, Turkey, Lebanon, Algeria, Tunisia, Greece, Italy, Slovenia and France. We prepared the show for 2 weeks, where each musician brought some of his musical tradition and original tunes and then we did four concerts in Festival d’Aix en Provence, La Savine & Villa Méditerranée (Marseille) and Unicredit Pavillon (Milan).
In September 2016 I did the releasing tour of my album ‘Vitamina D’, playing 6 concerts in some great venues such as Culturgest (Lisboa), Cine-Teatro Avenida (Castelo Branco) and Teatro Baltazar Dias (Funchal).
In 2017, the main focus was the band Mano a Mano. We recorded and released our album Vol.2 and we played it all around Portugal in festivals and concert halls. In April 2018, John Murph wrote about us in the Downbeat Magazine. 2017 was also the year that I played for the first time with Carlos Bica, a master of the double-bass and the music in general. Our first project together was a duo and after that a trio with João Mortágua came to life in 2017. In 2019 Carlos Bica & Maria João played together again after 25 years and that originated a new quartet with me on guitars and João Farinha on piano and keyboards.
