Who am I?

Born in 2000, Gato attended the practical Jazz course at the Luís Villas Boas Jazz School, where he studied with Ricardo Toscano. In 2018 he started a bachelor’s in Jazz Saxophone at Escola Superior de Música de Lisbon, where he studied with Desidério Lázaro, Pedro Moreira, Nelson Cascais, Gonçalo Marques and Afonso Pais, completing his degree in 2021. João Gato studied with Peter Evans between 2020 and 2021 and with Yedo Gibson from 2021 to 2023.

In the fall of 2023, Gato enrolled in the NoCom (Nordic Master: the composing musician) at the RMC of Copenhagen. Being a travelling master, Gato spent his first semester in Copenhagen studying with Lotte Anker, Peter Bruun and Kasper Tranberg and his second semester in Oslo with Torben Snekkestad. Gato is currently on his 3rd semester, in Gothemburg, studying composition with Merje Kägu, Thomas Markusson and Joel Eriksson.

In Jazz.pt’s critic, Gato was labeled as “one of the most interesting young musicians of the portuguese scene” (Nuno Catarino in Jazz.pt).

Having studied cinema for 3 years in high school, Gato frequently collaborates with director Francisco Miguel, through composition and execution of soundtracks for video art shorts, as is the case of Sargo (2018), Thirst Aid (2019) and Quelimane (2020).

Gato is a member of projects related to the area of dance, as is the case of the TETO collective – a research project that aims to deepen improvisation/composition tools transversal to sound and movement – and the Sonic Voyaging project (group of improvised dance/music).

He is also part of projects such as Filipa Franco Quinteto, Trafiklys, Francisco Nogueira Quinteto and S.E Pony.

Gato has played with musicians such as Peter Evans, Audrey Chen, Kresten Osgood, Bart Maris, Adele Viret, Nazaré da Silva, João Pereira, Nelson Cascais, João Valinho, Pedro Melo Alves,Samuel Gapp and the Hotclub de Portugal Jazz Orchestra. He has studied privately with musicians such as Peter Evans, Yedo Gibson, Fabrizio Cassol Perico Sambeat, Jacob Sacks, and Chris Pitsiokos