Luís de Freitas Branco (1890–1955) is usually appointed as the «introducer of modernism in Portugal», by his decisive role in the approximation of Portuguese music to the most innovative European aesthetics, namely the Schönberg atonalism and the French impressionism. Pupil of Augusto Machado and Tomás Borba, he studied with the Belgian organist and composer Désiré Pâque and, in 1910, went to Berlin to study with Humperdinck. There, he attended to a performance of Debussy's Pélleas et Mélisande, which was determinant in his aesthetic orientation. In his early work we count the symphonic poems "Váthek" and "Paraísos Artificiais" and several piano pieces. His prolific production includes five symphonies, a violin concert and enumerous vocal works.