Biography
Helena Marinho's main research interests include artistic research, 20th/21st centuries Portuguese music history and musical practices, music and gender, and empirical music studies. She is currently Associate Professor at the Department of Communication and Art of the University of Aveiro (Portugal), and coordinator of the Institute of Ethnomusicology - Centre of Studies in Music and Dance branch at the University of Aveiro. Her research outputs include books, edited books and book chapters published by Routledge, Colibri, Caminho, Imperial College Press, Brepols, Cambridge Scholars, MPMP, AVA Musical Editions, Editions Hispaniques, and articles for several national and international journals (Musicae Scientiae, Frontiers, Musica Hodie, Opus, E-Cadernos CES, Psychology of Music, Studies in Musical Theatre, Music & Practice, Vortex, among others). She is regularly selected to present her research at national and international conferences, and is often invited as keynote, and associated editor and reviewer of articles and books for international publications such as Opus, Psychology of Music, Debates, Orpheus Institute, Frontiers. Helena has led three multiannual competitive research projects financed by the Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT) and European funds: "Images from Land and Sea: Frederico de Freitas and music in twentieth-century Portuguese culture" (2012-15), "Euterpe unveiled: Women in Portuguese musical creation and interpretation during the 20th and 21st centuries", and "Xperimus: Experimentation in music in Portuguese culture: History, contexts and practices in the 20th and 21st centuries", and currently leads "Shores", a Creative Europe cooperation project.
At the University of Aveiro, she has acted as director of the Master in Music programme and as Erasmus+ department coordinator, and she is currently member of the scientific committee of the PhD in Music programme. She teaches mostly post-graduate courses, and has supervised 6 post-doctoral projects, 8 PhD theses (additionally, 10 ongoing doctoral students), and 36 Master of Music and Master of Music Education dissertations. She was a visiting researcher at the Orpheus Institute in 2018. Helena was an external expert in the evaluation of projects for the European Commission's Culture Programme, the Austrian Science Fund, and jury member in the evaluation of research scholarships and fellowships of the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology. She was member of the Executive Board of the Portuguese Society for Music Research between 2021 and 2024. She is currently a consultant of the Portuguese Agency for Assessment and Accreditation of Higher Education (A3ES). Helena obtained master's degrees at the Norwegian State School of Music (on a grant from the Norwegian Government) and at the University of Kansas (on a Fulbright scholarship). She concluded her PhD in 2004 at the University of Sheffield. She combines her academic research with a performing career as pianist, and this activity informs many of her artistic research outputs.
She has presented solo and chamber concerts in main venues and festivals in Portugal, as well as in the USA, Brazil, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ireland, UK, France, Spain, Italy, Greece, Sweden, Norway, Ethiopia, India. Her performing activities include projects with modern piano and fortepiano, and she has recorded (or participated in) 13 CDs, playing Classical and contemporary (acoustic and mixed) repertoire on both instruments. She has also made several recordings for Portuguese radio and television, and French television. She has premièred several contemporary works, and collaborates often with composers from Portugal and other countries. Twenty one of the projects she conceived and performed, which ground her artistic research, have been selected for funding by the Portuguese Culture Ministry.
