Paloma O'Shea Artiñano, 1st Marquise of O'Shea,[1] (born 1936), is a pianist, patron of the arts,[2] founder and current principal of the Queen Sofía College of Music and founder and president of the Albeniz Foundation.
Paloma O'Shea was born in Las Arenas, Vizcaya, Spain, a daughter of part-Irish José O'Shea y Sebastián de Erice and Basque María de la Asunción de Artíñano y Luzarraga, married at Concepción, Madrid, on 2 May 1935.[3] She started studying piano in 1941 in Bilbao and later moved to France to further her music studies.[1] At age 15 she won the Primer Premio Fin de Carrera and performed as soloist with the Bilbao Symphony Orchestra.[4] Several years later she married Emilio Botín, Executive Chairman of Grupo Santander and devoted herself to promoting classical music in Spain.[4]
In 1972 she founded the Concurso de Piano de Santander, which was later named after her and in 1991 founded the Queen Sofía College of Music,[1] a private music school, now one of the leading music schools in Spain.
She was given the rank of Marchioness of O'Shea by the King of Spain in 2008,[1] the Légion d'honneur of France,[2] the gold medal of the Spanish Institute in New York and the Picasso Award of the UNESCO.[2] She has 6 children and divides her time between Madrid and Santander.