Cellist Gustavo Tavares is a Doctor of Musical Arts and a versatile musician, playing frequently with classical as well as jazz and popular artists. He has performed throughout his home country, Brazil, and in famous concert halls around the world such as the Kennedy Center in Washington DC, the Carnegie Hall in New York, the UNESCO Hall in Paris, the Theatro Municipal in Rio de Janeiro, the Sala Bellas Artes in San Juan, Puerto Rico, the Linder Auditorium of Johannesburg, the Sala Puccini in Milano, the Teatro Palladium of Rome, and the Duke’s Hall of the Royal Academy of Music in London.

Radio and television appearances include concerts broadcasted by the American National Public Radio, the WQXR of New York, the Radio of the Brazilian Ministery of Culture (Radio MEC), the Slovenjan National Radio and Television, and the Italian RAI.

He has appeared as a soloist as well as a conductor with many orchestras, including the Orchestra d’Archi Italiana, the National Theater Orchestra in Brasília, the Johannesburg Philharmonic, the Princeton Chamber Symphony, the Maribor Philharmonie and the Orchestra Eufonia of Rimini.

Further appearances include festivals in four continents, such as Miami, New Brunswick, Heidelberg, Wiesbaden, Bologna, Stellenbosh, Hvar and Rio de Janeiro, as well as chamber music series in Los Angeles, San Francisco, El Paso, Rome, Manaus, São Paulo and Johannesburg, among others. In 2007, Gustavo Tavares was the featured artist at «The Global Cello», an event organized by the Violoncello Society of London.

Gustavo Tavares has been described as “one of the most important Brazilian names in the classical music of our time” (Correio Braziliense, 3.27.2005) and is considered a specialist on Latin American music. In 1995, together with clarinetist Paquito d’Rivera and pianist Pablo Zinger, he created the ensemble Triangulo, which according to American critic C. Berg helped «redefine the basic assumptions of chamber music». With this ensemble he has presented a diverse Latin American music repertoire for audiences throughout the world, and the ensemble recorded several CDs. One of these was nominated for a Grammy Award in 2001, and yet another was listed as “Record of the Year, 1997” by the Brazilian newspaper “O Estado de São Paulo”.

Also active as an arranger, his work has been performed and recorded by artists such as YoYo Ma and the Buenos Aires String Quartet, and edited by the American publisher Opus International.

He has been a student of Professor Antonio Janigro at the Stuttgart Musik Hochschule, in Germany, where he graduated with the highest marks in 1986. Later, while working towards his Doctorate, he was Professor Bernard Greenhouse’s assistant at Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey, USA. At Rutgers, alongside teaching cello and chamber music, he has also created and presented academic courses about various subjects related to Latin American music, and was for several years «Artist in Residence» at the Center for Latino Arts and Culture, where he also successfully developed a multi-year initiative called “The Latin American Chamber Music Project”. Still during his formative years as a musician, he worked on conducting, composition and analysis with masters such as Erhard Karkoshka, Claudio Santoro, Helmut Lachenman, Aurelio de la Vega, Noel da Costa, as well as his uncle, Mario Tavares.

Gustavo Tavares enjoys teaching and this activity has brought him in contact with talented young musicians, not just in well established conservatories and festivals of many countries but also in poor neighborhoods of Africa and the Americas. Schools where he has presented lectures and demonstrations include the Royal Academy of Music in London, the Aston Magna Academy of Boston and the South African Witwatersrand University. Master classes and workshops have included sessions at the Zagreb Music Academy, the California State University Northridge, the International Cello Encounter in Rio de Janeiro, and the Guidhall School of Music. His presentations and workshops for children have brought him in contact with students at for example the Harbour Conservatory of Harlem, in New York, the Melody Project of Soweto, in Johannesburg, and the Wauwatosa Public School District in Wisconsin. He has also served as a jury member at prestigious international competitions such as the 2004 Antonio Janigro Cello Competition, in Zagreb, and the 2008 Rudolf Matz Strings Competition in Dubrovnik.

Alongside his own concert schedule, since 1992 Gustavo Tavares also works as one of the Solo-Cellists of the Norwegian National Opera’s Orchestra, and he currently lives in Oslo. In Norway, his musical projects have also included a great variety of initiatives. In 1999 he recorded as a guest soloist with the famous Norwegian jazz group “Ytre Suløens Jass Ensemble”. He has served as a “Program Advisor” for the 2001 Vestfold Festspillene’s focus on Brazilian music.

In 2003, together with writer Vigdis Hjorth, he was involved in the multi-media project “På Grensen.” In 2007, together with pianist Sverre Indris Joner, he developed the program “Latino Classico”, an educational project under the auspices of the Norwegian Concert Institute (Rikskonsertene). Another musical association in Norway has been his duo project with organist Anders Hovind; highlights of this collaboration include festivals in Norway, Sweden and Germany. He is a member of the Norwegian Musicians Union (MFO) as well as of the author and performing rights bureaus TONO and GRAMO.

Gustavo Tavares can be heard on recordings by the labels Peregrina Music, Herman Records, Mix House, Karmin, and Triangulo Records, and some of his arrangements can be heard on recordings by Epsa Music as well as Sony Classical.