Invited to play for Nelson Mandela
Samson Diamond, violin tutor at this year’s Sasol National Youth Orchestra Course, and Sophia Welz, SANYOF Chief Operations Officer, were invited to visit Nelson Mandela on 15 September. What an honour to be in the presence of our very own Madiba and for Samson to play for him!
Samson performed Meditation by Jules Massenet from the opera Thais and IV Toccata from the Partita for violin solo by Vytautas Barkauskas. Madiba’s smile and enthusiastic applause said it all and the Nationals Team has been on Cloud 9 ever since!
Samson Diamond is a graduate of the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester, UK, where he obtained both his Bachelor’s (2006) and Master’s (2007) degrees in music with distinction. Samson’s first taste of music came from Rosemary Nalden in Johannesburg. He also studied under the tutelage of Richard Ireland, Pauline Nobes and the French violinist Philippe Graffin.
Awards won during his studies include the Charles Hallé Award, the RNCM Eric Nicholson Bow Prize, the RNCM Major Entrance Award, the Edward Heaton Scholarship and the RNCM Philip Newman Violin Prize.
His reputation as a fine orchestral violinist is growing rapidly and has seen him perform at prestigious venues such as the Berlin Philharmonie, the Bela Bartok National Concert Hall in Budapest and the Musikverein in Vienna. As a freelance violinist he has performed with some of Britain’s top orchestras such as the Hallé Orchestra, the Academy of St Martin’s in the Fields, the BBC Philharmonic, the Manchester Camerata and the Academy of Ancient Music, gaining experience under distinguished conductors such as Sir Mark Elder, Gianandrea Noseda, Sir Neville Marriner, Yan Pascal Tortellier and Stanislav Skrowacevski.
As the leader of the Buskaid Soweto String Ensemble, Samson is privileged to have performed at the 2007 BBC Proms at the Royal Albert Hall with the English Baroque Soloists and the Montiverdi Choir conducted by John Eliot Gardiner. He is also privileged to have performed before dignitaries such as Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, HRH The Duke of Edinburgh, HRH The Duke of York, President Thabo Mbeki, British Prime Minister Tony Blair, German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder and New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark – and now the cherry on the top, one-on-one for Nelson Mandela.
Samson Diamond is very active in community outreach from busking and workshops to community concerts all over the world. He has worked with the Haringey Young Musicians in London as violin coach and soloist, visiting schools in North London and introducing classical music to under-privileged communities, and toured Jamaica with the ensemble. He’s now back in South Africa and SANYOF has high hopes of continuing our collaboration.
