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14 October 2019 | Story Rulanzen Martin | Photo Sonia Small
OSM Camerata
The OSM Camerata also performed at the Rector’s Concert on 6 September under direction of conductor Elsabe Raath.


The Odeion School of Music Camerata (OSMC) is one of the flagship music ensembles at the University of the Free State (UFS). Its reputation as one of the country’s top student chamber ensembles far equlas its impeccable music.

At the end of September the Camerata undertook a tour with concerts in Pretoria and Johannesburg. They held a concert in the new Javett Arts Centre at the University of Pretoria (UP) where they presented a lunch-hour concert which featured modern musical arrangements. At a gala concert, on 28 September 2019, which was hosted in the Musaion Concert hall at UP they collaborated with the UP Department of Music and the Gauteng Chamber Music Festival.  

The last leg of the tour ended at the University of the Witwatersrand Atrium on 29 September 2019. According Marius Coetzee, innovation manager at the OSM: “it is important to go on tour in order to recruit new outstanding students and to showcase the excellence of the Camerata and the Odeion School of Music.” 

The OSMC has also forged a professional internship with the Cape Philharmonic Orchestra to solidify and advance the skills of the young orchestral musicians. 

The OSMC was also the 2017 and 2018 winner of the International Ictus Music competition.  

The OSMC was strategically founded by Marius Coetzee to serve as a feasible incubator for nurturing of fully rounded musicians who are thoroughly prepared for the demands of their trade as orchestral musicians, soloists and conductors.  

News Archive

Valour inspires book on community protests
2016-10-18

Description: Dr Matebesi book cover Tags: Dr Matebesi book cover

The cover of Dr Sethulego Matebesi’s
book, Civil strife against local governance:
Dynamics of community protests in
contemporary South Africa, that will be
released on 1 November 2016.
Photo: Supplied

Two significant political events: the murder of an unarmed protester, and school children forced out of school sparked the idea to write a book on community protests.
The book, Civil strife against local governance: Dynamics of community protests in contemporary South Africa, by Dr Sethulego Matebesi, gives an academic account of service delivery protests in South Africa.

Research address protests in different communities
“The focus of my book is on community protests directed against municipalities in both predominantly black and white communities,” Dr Matebesi, senior lecturer in the Department of Sociology at the University of the Free State, said. The funding for the book was received from the National Research Foundation and the Erasmus Mundus EU-Saturn Scholarship.

Informs literature on service delivery protests

The struggle against municipalities reaches across geographic and demographic boundaries, but the violent turn of protests in black communities in contrast to white communities has become somewhat of a hegemonic account by scholars. “The book connects the critical issue of community protests with the equally precarious issue of political trust in local government,” Dr Matebesi said. Case studies in the book are indicative of significant shifts in community protest – thus making it timely. Dr Matebesi said: “The book informs the growing literature on community protests and also fills an empirical void by including protesters in residents’ associations.”

“The book is a personal milestone and
the single greatest return on the
sacrifices made over the past 4 years.”





Personal milestone worth the sacrifice
Research was conducted between 2012 and 2015, whereby two case study sites were selected in four provinces to account the different tactics used. “The book is a personal milestone and the single greatest return on the sacrifices made over the past four years,” Dr Matebesi said.

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