Cândido Lima was born in 1939 in Viana do Castelo. He graduated in Piano and Composition at the Conservatories of Music in Lisbon and Porto on a scholarship from the Gulbenkian Foundation and other organisations, and in Philosophy and Humanities at the Faculty of Philosophy in Braga. He was awarded a Doctorate from the University of Paris I – Sorbonne, (and an unfinished Doctorat d’État).
He studied composition with Xenakis and conducting with Gilbert Amy and Michel Tabachnik. He studied Electroacoustics and Music Informatics at the Universities of Vincennes and Panthéon-Sorbonne, having interned at IRCAM and CEMAMu. He was a scholarship holder of the Secretary of State for Culture.
Cândido Lima collaborated with the press and with the Ministry of Education on reforms in music education in Portugal. He is the author of the television series Sons e Mitos, Fronteiras da Música, No Ventre da Música, Evocações (ABZ by Júlio Montenegro)and, for Radio, Of all Music, in the Programa da Manhã by Júlio Montenegro (Premium de Imprensa de 1987 – RDP/Antenna 1).
He was responsible for the visits to Portugal of some great musicians such as the “Encontro com Xenakis” in Porto, at Cinema Trindade, 1973. He presented with Xenakis, in Lisbon, the UPIC / CEMAMu. He interviewed Iannis Xenakis, Gyorgy Ligeti and Pierre Boulez. He wrote essays and other texts, both published and unpublished.
He was the first Portuguese composer to simultaneously use, among other means, computer, electroacoustics and orchestra (Oceanos. A-mèr-es, etc.,). He taught, among other schools, at the Conservatório de Música and at the Escola Superior de Música do Porto (Adjunct Professor and Coordinating Professor). He chaired the Musical Youth of Braga, the Musica Nova Group and was director of the Conservatories of Braga and Porto. He has been a contributor to the Enciclopédia Verbo since 1972. He was invited by Pascal Dusapin, who dedicated the work “Canto” to him, to join the selection jury of the Académie Européènne de Composition” (with W.Rhim, M.Lindberg, K.Huber, G. .Benjamin and J. Dillon).