Frederico Guedes de Freitas, composer, conductor and pedagogue was born in Lisbon on November 15, 1902, where he died on January 12, 1980. He begins his musical studies with his mother, Elvira Cândida de Freitas, remarkable pianist, disciple of Francisco Baía and Francisco de Lacerda. At the age of thirteen he is admitted at the National Conservatory, where he studies piano with Carlos Reis, violin with Alexandre de Bettencourt, musical science with Luís de Freitas Branco, harmony with José Henrique dos Santos and counterpoint, fugue and composition with António Eduardo da Costa Ferreira. His first works – Two Hail Maries in homage to Our Lady – appear three years later, in 1918. In parallel with his composition studies, Frederico de Freitas also took a liking to orchestra conduction. For that purpose he studied with the maestros Vittorio Gui and Willem Mengelberg. In this area he was appointed to First Subdirector Conductor of the Emissora Nacional Symphonic Orchestra, to which he was related for fourty years. This long cooperation resulted in hundreds of concerts that took place both in Portugal and abroad. Frederico de Freitas was also Director of the Oporto Music Conservatory Symphonic Orchestra in the period between 1949 and 1953, and Titular Conducter of the Emissora Nacional Concert Orchestra from 1956 onwards. In the area of composition Frederico de Freitas left us an abundant work, covering practically all musical genres, including even music for revues, vaudevilles, operettas and for the cinema.