João Guilherme
Daddi

Since his early childhood, João Guilherme Daddi (1813-1887) showed a great talent, playing the piano, for the first time, in public, at the Real Teatro de São Carlos, when he was only nine years old. On 13 May 1825, he made his debut as composer, conducting a two-part cantata with choirs, composed by him, in the presence of King D. João VI of Portugal, whose birthday was celebrated on that date. The Monarch congratulated him heartily, and promised him his protection. In 1833, with the advent of the Constitutional Government, he composed a Te Deum to celebrate the landing of D. Maria II of Portugal in Lisbon. When Franz Liszt was in Lisbon, at the beginning of 1845, appreciating the unusual conditions of the Portuguese artist, he proposed that they both present themselves in São Carlos, playing a fantasy for two pianos by Sigismond Thalberg. He also played with Polish pianist Antoni Kontsky. João Guilherme Bell Daddi had the glory of being the first, among the Portuguese, to hold public sessions of Chamber Music, in a recital he gave at the Teatro Nacional D. Maria II, on 10 May 1863, with music by Ludwig van Beethoven, Franz Joseph Haydn and Carl Maria von Weber. A few years later, he organized a society, which was called the Society of Classical Concerts.