Rafael Kyrychenko

Born in São Miguel, Azores Islands, Portugal, in 1996. Since 2021 he studies at the Reina Sofía School of Music’s Fundación Banco Santander Piano Chair with professor Milana Chernyavska. He has been granted scholarships by Santander Portugal and Fundación Albéniz.

He began his studies at the age of 5 with his mother, Cristina Pliousnina. He graduated from the Royal Conservatory of Brussels, where he studied with Daniel Blumenthal, and also pursued studies at the Queen Elisabeth Music Chapel with Maria João Pires. He has attended masterclasses by Dmitri Bashkirov, Leonid Margarius, Sergei Edelman, Philippe Entremont, Markus Groh, Michel Béroff, Stanislav Ioudenitch, Rena Shereshevskaya, Elisabeth Leonskaja, Nikolai Demidenko, Ralf Gothóni, and Florent Boffard. In addition, he had the opportunity of performing for Queen Mathilde of Belgium during one of her visits to the Conservatory of Brussels.

Since his first award in an international competition at the age of 8, he has been awarded several prizes in prestigious competitions such as Barcelona’s María Canals International Piano Competition, Aarhus International Piano Competition, Lugano Piano Competition and André Charlier Piano Competition in Belgium.

He has also performed with the Porto Symphony Orchestra, the Gulbenkian Orchestra, the Aarhus Symphony Orchestra and the Valés Symphony Orchestra, under the baton of renowned conductors Mikhail Jurowski, Michael Schonwandt, Philippe Entremont, Andris Poga, and Jordi Francés.

As a student of the School, he has performed within The Rising Generation series at the National Auditorium, and he has been a member of the KPMG Schubert Quintet. He is currently part of the Fundación Mahou San Miguel and the Management Solutions Tchaikovsky trios.