Born in Porto, Portugal, Álvaro Teixeira Lopes studied with Isabel Rocha, Jorge Moyano and Helena Sá Costa in Portugal and with Paul Badura Skoda, Noel Flores in Vienna and Marian Ribicky in Paris.

Artistic Director of the Santa Cecilia International Competition, he is Director of the Silva Monteiro Music Course and Guest Associate Professor at the Department of Communication and Art of the University of Aveiro.

With many students as prize winners at national and international competitions, Álvaro is often invited to join juries of piano competitions both in Portugal and abroad, having already been a juror of several international competitions such as the International Piano Competition of Oporto, Composers of Spain, Iturbi, Concours International de Piano de Lyon e de Épinal, Maestro Arts em Taiwan, César Franck, Cleveland Virtualoso, Isidor Basič, Rina Sala Gallo, Orbetello, Neue Sterne, Scriabin, Rospigliosi, Aquaviva, Valentino Buchi, Pro-Piano and Rio de Janeiro International Piano Festival, among many others.

Author of the Piano Manual published by the Ministry of Education of Portugal, he has carried out an intense pedagogical activity both as a certified advisor by the Ministry of Education and through Master-Classes he has given in Portugal and abroad.

He has recorded for Numérica and dedicated much of his pianistic activity to the promotion of Portuguese piano and chamber music. Member of Solistas do Porto and Khora Ensemble, he has a duo with pianist Fausto Neves and with guitarist Francisco Berény.

He is the artistic director of several festivals, including the Festival Internacional de Piano de Sta. Cecília.