Born in Santiago de Compostela (Spain). He has studied early harps (from 12th century until 18th century) in Madrid with Nuria Llopis (Spanish arpa de dos órdenes). Besides, he studied in Milan with Mara Galassi (Italian arpa doppia).As a professional carrier, he has collaborated with several groups: Elyma ensemble, Camerata Iberia, Les musicians du Louvre, Al ayre español, The Munich Choral society, the Ars Longa ensemble of Havana (Cuba), La trulla de voces, Capella de ministrers, Música Ficta, Capella de Ministres, La galanía, Os Segreis de Lisboa (Portugal), La hispanoflamenca, Forma Antiqua, etc. He has also done “solo” concerts in programmes focused on Renaissance and baroque music both from Spain and America and performed in: The Amherst Early Music Festival (Amherst-Massachussets-USA), the week of early music (Santiago de Chile), concerts in the University of Cantabria (Spain) I festival Via Stellae (Santiago de Compostela. Spain), the Esteban Salas Festival (La Havana –Cuba) The Haarlem Festival (Holland). He has recorded about 60 CDs with Medieval, Renaissance and Baroque repertoires which have been recorded by several record companies: K 617, Verso, Naxos, Pasacaille, Arsis, La ma de Guido, Enchiriadis, etc. He is specialized in Italian, Portuguese and Spanish harp and voice Baroque music pieces. As a result he has offered recitals with the following singers:
Roberta Invernizzi, Marta Infante, Raquel Andueza, Juan Sancho, Yeztabel Arias, Guillemette Laurens, Monica Piccinini, Felix Rienth, Isabel Monar.
In 2008 he founded the Ars Atlántica ensemble which performed a premiere of the cantatas found in the Palacio Contarini (Venice). The recording of this cantatas received the Prelude Award in Holland as one of the best early music records of 2010.
He is the artistic director of the project of recording the “Guerra Manuscript”. This project includes the complete recording of 100 songs of the XVII Spanish century in six records. The first record of this project was published in January 2011 and the second in 2012. The “Guerra Manuscript” is involving the Ars Atlántica ensemble along with the Via Stellae Festival in Santiago de Compostela, the Public Radio Station in Galicia and the Naxos record company.
He is also pioneer in the study of certain harps totally forgotten today such as Chiquitana Harp (Bolivia XVIII Century) and the Catalonian/Aragonian Harp (XIV century)
He has often given conferences, courses, master classes and training sessions in United States, Colombia, Cuba, Belgium, Spain and Chile. In August 2013 he gave a course of medieval harp in the medieval town of Guadalaviar (Albarracín-Spain)
Recently, Manuel Vilas was invited in representation of the Spanish harpists in the 6th World Harp Festival in Asunción (Paraguay)
