Bloemfontein cellist Willie Naudé (21), a third-year music student at the Odeion School of Music (OSM), is performing with the Cape Philharmonic Orchestra (CPO) tonight (04/05).
This University of the Free State (UFS) student studies under the tutelage of Prof. Anmari van der Westhuizen.
He has been considered for an internship at the Cape Philharmonic Orchestra.
The OSM innovation manager, Marius Coetzee, who initiated this collaboration with Louis Heyneman of the CPO in 2019, said the main objectives of the internship was that talented OSM students would be mentored to develop their musicianship, as well as technical and orchestra skills, under the auspices of the CPO musicians – and simultaneously advance the CPO’s objectives in training musicians to take their place on the symphony stage in South Africa.
Naudé will be the third youngest musician of the OSM to participate in this collaboration.
“I hope this collaboration will also serve as a catalyst to advance employment,” Coetzee said about the performance.
Naudé won the prestigious National Victoria K. Bennet Competition and progressed to the final round of the annual Human Naudé Music Scholarship Competition in 2022. He was selected as a musician for the first Young Virtuosi Chamber Collective. He received coaching under the guidance of revered South African violinist Charlotte Potgieter, principal of the second violin section of the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra in the Netherlands.
Naudé received masterclasses with international visiting cellists such as Ben Capps, Thomas Carrol, Alexander Buslov and Gerard Korsten, to name a few.
At the OSM, he is the principal of the cello section of the Free State Youth Orchestra and often plays under the mentorship of Van der Westhuizen in the Free State Symphony Orchestra.
Naudé was a Tres Amici piano trio member and was the category winner of the Pretoria SASMT Ensemble Competition in 2017 and 2018. He participated in the National Youth Music Competition in 2019, and in 2021 he took part and was a semifinalist.
Naudé participated in the NEA Young Performers Award several times. He was the overall winner in his age group in 2017 and 2019, as well as the Philip Moore Competition. Naudé was announced as the winner in 2013, and runner-up in 2015 and 2016.
