Paulo Costa Lima is a Brazilian composer and music theorist, a member of the Brazilian Academy of Music (created by Villa-Lobos in 1945), whose main interest has been the vivid interaction between composition and culture, including the political aspects of it, namely, composition as a way of resisting colonization, against the "waste of experience" - the traditional circuit in which ideas (theory) are produced elsewhere and absorbed by the South. Born in Salvador-Bahia in 1954, he has always cultivated an interest in Afro-Brazilian musical heritage. He is also a member of the Academia de Letras da Bahia (created in 1917), a founder-member of the Academia de Ciências da Bahia (created in 2011) and a recognized researcher by the CNPq, the National Council for Research (since 2003). In 2015 he was indicated as first prize winner of the Bienal de Música Brasileira Contemporânea, after a consultation involving 120 Brazilian composers and conductors. He has published books and articles on subjects such as the theory and pedagogy of musical composition, analysis and history of Brazilian contemporary music, analysis of Brazilian popular songs , and the possible dialogue between music, psychoanalysis and cultural semantics. His works have received more than 500 performances in more than 20 countries in important concert halls such as Konzerthaus Berlin, Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, Benaroya Hall, De Rode Pomp, Sala Cecilia Meireles, Sala São Paulo, Teatro Castro Alves and Reitoria da UFBA. In 2001 The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians included an article dedicated to his work, written by Gerard Béhague. He has received along the last decades more than twenty prizes and commissions.