About us

Two concert pianists. One method. Thirty years of students.

A sought-after husband and wife team, pianists Dr. Francisco Silva, DMA and Mireille Gradeff Silva, MM are active performing and recording artists who teach from their home studio in East Cobb, Marietta.

Between them they bring more than 45 years each of teaching and performing, most of it side by side with daily review and discussion. That synergy produced the Silva Piano Method, and it has benefited hundreds of students and several affiliated teachers.

Their two sons are musicians too, both trained in the Silva Piano Method. Ariel is a professional music producer, known as Sensei Atl. Dorian taught at the studio before leaving for law school at the University of South Carolina in 2026.

Mireille and Francisco Silva playing together at the grand piano

Mireille and Francisco at the studio

Our vision

A better way to teach the piano

Years of research, writing materials and applying sensory integration concepts, combined with the skills of two concert pianists, led to a method the Silvas consider the standard of excellence for piano training. The goal: put it in the hands of anyone, anywhere, who wants to play.

45+

Years each, teaching and performing

Francisco and Mireille have refined their approach together, lesson after lesson, for decades.

Year to real music

Beginners reach a level in one year that usually takes three to five with other methods.

∞

Questions asked

The Silvas keep questioning the status quo, adding exercises and techniques to their books with every revision. Technique starts at the very first lesson.

Pianist, instructor Dr. Francisco Silva at the piano

Dr. Francisco Silva, DMA

Co-founder, concert pianist, co-author of the Silva Piano Method

The spontaneity of Francisco Silva's playing has been admired in concert halls for more than three decades. He burst onto the international scene at age 23 with legend-making performances of the complete cycle of Beethoven's 32 piano sonatas, and at 26 performed and recorded the complete works of Maurice Ravel, a project commissioned by the French Chamber of Commerce. He was the first pianist ever to perform the Beethoven sonata cycle in Georgia, presenting the works in a spellbinding series of eight recitals at the Woodruff Arts Center to critical acclaim.

The lyricism and communicative power of his playing are no coincidence. He began lessons with a La Scala-trained Italian tenor in the suburbs of São Paulo, Brazil, and that vocal, dramatic approach to the piano has marked his interpretations ever since. Studies with pianist and composer Amaral Vieira in Brazil and with Dickran Atamian at the University of Michigan, in the grand tradition of Louis Kentner and Jorge Bolet, shaped his unique abilities. He earned his Master's degree at Arizona State University with the acclaimed pedagogue Caio Pagano before completing his Doctorate at the University of Michigan.

His first major prize, at 17, led to a debut with the São Paulo State Orchestra under Maestro John Neschling. In Brazil he became the youngest recipient of the Art Critics Association's "Best Pianist of the Year" award, for the Beethoven cycle. In the United States he has received prestigious research grants and academic awards. A sought-after chamber musician who has collaborated with singers and instrumentalists on three continents, he has performed the complete Beethoven violin and piano sonatas, premiered Amaral Vieira's Piano Concerto, and been featured on NPR's Performance Today and TV Cultura in Brazil.

Today Dr. Silva is deeply committed to sharing his knowledge with students, teachers and the public. With his wife he developed the Silva Piano Method, a book and recording set designed for the fastest yet most comprehensive piano study available, with plans to launch it worldwide. An articulate communicator, he loves engaging audiences in conversation about the composers and works on his programs.

Silva told a terrifying tale, full of rage and sorrow and fresh ideas, in short, a thoughtful musician at work. His music-making is of the sort that builds a loyal following.Pierre Ruhe, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Pianist, instructor Mireille Gradeff Silva at the piano

Mireille Gradeff Silva, MM

Co-founder, concert pianist, co-author of the Silva Piano Method

French-born, Bulgarian-American Mireille Gradeff Silva started piano lessons at seven and credits much of her artistic foundation to her childhood teacher, New York pianist Aurora Ragaini Martin. By 14 she was already teaching piano. Solid training and dedication led to several first prizes at piano competitions and music scholarship awards. She completed her undergraduate studies at Rutgers University with Maria Katona Valgoczy, studied with Francis Wang, a student of the legendary Juilliard professor Rosina Lhévinne, and earned her Master's degree in Piano Performance with Walter Cosand at Arizona State University.

In performance she displays a formidable technique and an affinity for the Romantic repertoire: Schumann, Schubert, Rachmaninoff and Chopin. Her recitals in Brazil, Michigan and across Georgia have been greeted with enthusiasm. She gave the US premieres of selected works by Bulgarian composers, collaborates with singers and instrumentalists in chamber music, performs four-hand works with her husband, and has appeared as soloist in Rachmaninoff's Second Piano Concerto with the Alpharetta Symphony Orchestra under Grant Gilman. She is currently preparing Bach's monumental Goldberg Variations for recording and performance.

A sought-after teacher, lecturer and performer, Ms. Silva has served on the faculty of the Center for Creative Studies, Institute of Music and Dance in Detroit, and is a past President of the Atlanta Music Teachers Association. For more than twenty years she has trained other piano teachers, pianists and students at Silva Music Studios.

Her other passion is the ongoing research behind the Silva Piano Method and its recordings, co-authored with Dr. Silva: an approach to teaching beginners that is efficient yet comprehensive, organised around the technical, listening, sensory-integration and analytical skills a pianist truly needs. Using these materials, scores of Silva students have reached impressive levels of proficiency in a remarkably short time.

Amazing technique and exquisite Chopin playing.Concert review

Mireille performs Rachmaninoff's Piano Concerto No. 2 with the Alpharetta Symphony Orchestra, Grant Gilman conducting.

From the critics

What the press has written

His reading of the Moonlight Sonata was psychologically probing and rocked at full tilt in the finale, quite exhilarating piano playing.

Pierre Ruhe, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

In this recording of the complete works of Ravel, Silva proves that he is indeed an interpreter. He possesses sensational virtuosity and a refined sense of style.

O Jornal do Brasil

How many Brazilian pianists would attempt a program so incredibly demanding and yet play it so well? Plaudite, sonat tuba! Applaud, sound the trumpet!

José da Veiga Oliveira, O Diário Popular

Francisco Silva is a superb pianist, with a most exact technique, scrupulously respectful of the aesthetic meaning of the music.

A Folha de São Paulo

Our team

Teachers trained in the Silva Piano Method

Every instructor at the studio teaches the same method, so siblings can have their lessons at the same time and students can move between teachers without missing a step.

Dr. Lingyi Guo

Piano · Doctor of Musical Arts

Dr. Guo holds a Doctor of Musical Arts in Piano Performance from the University of Georgia, a Master's from the University of Nebraska at Omaha and a Bachelor's from the Sichuan Conservatory of Music. She has performed as a soloist across China, Singapore, Europe and the United States, including at Carnegie Hall as a first-prize winner of the Golden Classical Music Awards.

More about Dr. Guo

A top prize winner of the Liszt Memorial Prizes Hong Kong International Piano Open Competition, the ZhongXin International Music Competition, the University of Georgia Concerto Competition and the GMTA State Auditions, she brings more than twelve years of teaching experience with students from age five through adulthood, and is passionate about building musicality, technique and confidence.

Mariya Tzvetkova

Violin and viola

A graduate of the Bulgarian State Academy of Music "Pancho Vladigerov" in Sofia with a Master's degree and additional qualification in music pedagogy, Mariya has taught at Silva Music Studios since 2006. She brings the strings program to the studio, opening the door to ensemble playing with our pianists.

More about Mariya

Her career includes positions as violist with the UANL Symphony Orchestra in Monterrey, Mexico, the New Symphony Orchestra in Sofia, and the International Symphony Orchestra and String Quartet of the Yehudi Menuhin Foundation in France. She has served as concertmaster of youth orchestras in Sofia and is a three-time winner of Bulgaria's national "Svetoslav Obretenov" competition.

Silva Pianists in performance