Lucia Barrenechea

Studies and academic production

Lucia Barrenechea is a native of Goiania, Brazil and currently holds a teaching position at Instituto Villa-Lobos of UNIRIO-Universidade Federal do Estado do Rio de Janeiro, including research and advising activities at its Graduate Programs in Music.

She has a BM in piano performance from the Universidade Federal de Goiás, where she was a student of Glacy Antunes de Oliveira, and a MM from The Boston University, where she studied with Maria-Clodes Jaguaribe.

She received her DMA in Piano Performance from the University of Iowa under the instruction of Réne Lecuona. Ms. Barrenechea acted as soloist and pianist colaborator in various master classes by well-known artists, such as Caio Pagano, Yara Bernette, Homero Magalhães, Joseph Kalischstein, Menahem Pressler, Florence Kirsch, Julius Baker, Carol Wincenc, and others.

She had been a piano professor at the Escola de Música e Artes Cênicas of the Universidade Federal de Goiás, from 1994 to 2006, where she was head of the Artist Diploma Program in Music from 2001 to 2003, and taught in the Graduate Program.

 

In 2002, she performed and presented a paper at the I International Villa-Lobos Conference in Paris. She acted as a pianist accompanying the 24th, 27th and 28th CIVEBRA - International Summer Course of Brasília (2002, 2005 and 2006). She was collaborator pianist at International Flutist Festivals of ABRAF (2000, 2007 and 2008). In 2008 he was a pianist invited to play with Püchner artists at the V International Meeting of Oboe and Bassoon, held at Faculdade Cantareira in São Paulo.

 

In 2007, she participated as piano and chamber music teacher at the 4th International Meeting of Pianists of the Conservatory of Tatuí-SP in 2007 and in the 29th, 30th, 31st, 32nd, 33rd, 35th and 36th editions of the International Summer Course in Brasilia ( 2007 to 2011, 2013 and 2014).

 

In 2000, she published a chapter, with Cristina Caparelli Gerling, "Villa-Lobos e Chopin: O Diálogo Musical das Nacionalidades", in the book Três Estudos Analíticos: Villa-Lobos, Mignone e Camargo Guarnieri, published by the Graduate Program at Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul.

 

She is the co-organizer of the sheet music book "The Music for Flute and Piano of Francisco Mignone", together with Sergio Barrenechea and Clayton Vetromilla, released in 2016. For more information regarding Lucia's academic production, please refer to her curriculum at CNPQ's Plataforma Lattes.

 

Solo career

Featured as soloist, Lucia Barrenechea presented regularly in recitals in many Brazilian cities. She also acted as soloist in concerts with orchestras such as the Orquestra Sinfônica Estadual de São Paulo, the Filarmônica de Goiás, the Sinfônica de Goiânia, the Sinfônica Jovem de Goiás, the Sinfônica do Teatro Nacional Claudio Santoro and the Sinfônica de Barra Mansa, under the direction of Eleazar de Carvalho, Emanuel Martinez, Parcival Módolo, Eliseu Ferreira, Fabio Mechetti, Norton Morozowicz and Vladmir Prado.

 

Her first solo album“Saracoteio - Piano Brasileiro” has been released, in 2009, by the label Ethos Brasil, including works of Brazilian composers. This album was re-released in 2023 and is available on digital platforms.

 

In 2024, the pianist releases the album "Pra Piano" which is a project with recordings made at home, during the pandemic years, with the musical direction of Sérgio Barrenechea. All the music were broadcast on the YouTube platform, at different events. The idea of releasing these recordings in the form of an album is a way of giving new meaning to this period, placing this repertoire in a new context of my artistic moment, in addition to diversifying the way to promote Brazilian music. The works recorded are by who have contributed extensively to Brazilian piano: Henrique Oswald, Maria Luisa Priolli, Dawid Korenchendler, Caio Senna, Claudia Caldeira, Léa Freire, Marcelo Caldi (with whom the pianist shares a waltz) and Marcos Lucas. The album is also available on the main digital platforms.

 

She has performed first auditions of solo piano works by Brazilian composers such as Alexandre Schubert, Caio Senna, Dawid Korenchendler, Estércio Marquez Cunha, Edson Santanna, among others.

Musical partnership

Recognized as a notable chamber pianist, she has performed with well known musiciansin the national and international musical scene and has recorded projects that involve the repertoire of different instrumental formations, such as a CD for works with trio with piano, with the violinist Mariana Salles and the cellist Marcelo Salles, and the CD "Oboe of Brazil" by the oboist José Medeiros.

Her most recent project was the recording in two volumes of CD (Vol. I and II), DVD and Blu-Ray (Vol. I) of "Villa-Lobos Presence in Brazilian Music for Cello and Piano" (2013 and 2017), in partnership with cellist Hugo Pilger, which repertoire includes the complete works for cello and piano by Villa-Lobos, as well as compositions by other Brazilian composers. This project yielded the nomination for the 26th Brazilian Music Award.

With her husband, the flutist Sergio Barrenechea, forms, since 1989, the Duo Barrenechea, developing intense chamber music activities with the flute and piano combination. The Duo Barrenechea released, in 2008, their first commercial CD Moments in Paris, with French music. Later, they recorded the triple CD Triplo " The Flute Music of Francisco Mignone" (2011) and the CD/DVD "Brasileirissimo: Encounters (2015).