Born in Lisbon, Portugal in 1968, Artur Pizarro gave his first public performance at the age of three and made his television début on Portuguese television at the age of four. From 1974 to 1990 Artur studied with Sequeira Costa who had been a student of Vianna da Motta and of Mark Hamburg, Edwin Fischer, Marguerite Long and Jacques Février.

This distinguished lineage immersed Artur in the tradition of the ‘Golden Age’ of pianism. He also studied with Jorge Moyano, Aldo Ciccolini, Géry Moutier and Bruno Rigutto. Pizarro won first prizes in the 1987 Vianna da Motta Competition, the 1988 Greater Palm Beach Symphony Competition and won first prize at the 1990 Leeds International Pianoforte Competition, which marked the beginning of an international concert career.

He performs internationally in recital, chamber music and with the world’s leading orchestras and conductors. Pizarro has recorded extensively (almost 50 CDs) for Collins Classics, Hyperion Records, Linn Records, Brilliant Classics, Klara, Naxos, Danacord, Odradek Records and Phoenix Edition. He has received the Portuguese Press Award, the Portuguese Society of Authors award, the Medal of Culture of the City of Funchal, Portuguese Government’s Medal of Cultural Merit, as well as the Albéniz Prize by the Albéniz Festival in Camprodon, Spain. Pizarro has created his private teaching studio in Oeiras, Portugal where he coaches students of various ages and levels.

Marta Zabaleta completed her musical studies in San Sebastian at the age of 16, receiving first prize in piano. She then went on to continue her studies at some of the most prestigious European academies: the National Superior Conservatory of Music in Paris under Dominique Merlet, the Reina Sofía College of Music in Madrid with Dmitri Bashkirov, and the Marshall Academy in Barcelona with Alicia de Larrocha. She received many prizes at international competitions such as the Santander ‘Paloma O’Shea’, Darmstadt, Premio Jaén and the Pilar Bayona International Piano Competition. She has made a number of recordings, which include the works of Rodrigo, Larrocha, and Granados. Marta is currently professor of piano at Musikene (the Higher Academy of Music of the Basque Country), and, at the wish of her predecessor Alicia de Larrocha, she is the current director of the Granados-Marshall Academy in Barcelona. In this prestigious Academy, Marta gives regular piano masterclasses in interpretation and virtuosity, and in particular the Spanish piano repertoire. She was recently awarded the Albéniz Medal by the Fundación Isaac Albéniz.

Robert Andres is a graduate of Zagreb Music Academy (Croatia), having afterwards studied at the St. Petersburg Conservatory. He continued his studies in Vienna and inthe U.S.A., where, on a Fulbright scholarship, he studied with Sequeira Costa at the University of Kansas, receiving a doctorate in musical arts and a master’s degree in musicology.

He performed recitals, concertos with orchestra and chamber music in many countries. Andres teaches at the Conservatory – School of Arts of Madeira and is the artistic director of the Madeira PianoFest. He has written for many specialized music magazines, encyclopaedias and journals in various countries, and his book on the beginnings of the scientific approach to piano technique was published by Scarecrow Press in the U.S.A. in 2001.

He regularly gives masterclasses and has been on juries of more than twenty international competitions.