Gonҫalo Maia Caetano wins Prince’s Prize

Florence Lockheart
Monday, April 17, 2023

Classical guitarist Gonҫalo Maia Caetano was awarded the competitions first prize of £5,000

Prince’s Prize winner Gonҫalo Maia Caetano (centre) with (left to right) Jeff Kelly, Susan Bullock, Professor Vanessa Latarche and Sir Nicholas Kenyon (Image courtesy of A Star PR)
Prince’s Prize winner Gonҫalo Maia Caetano (centre) with (left to right) Jeff Kelly, Susan Bullock, Professor Vanessa Latarche and Sir Nicholas Kenyon (Image courtesy of A Star PR)

The Musicians’ Company has announced this year’s winner of the Prince’s Prize. Classical guitarist Gonҫalo Maia Caetano was awarded first prize at the competition’s prize concert held at the Guildhall School of Music & Drama’s Music Hall on 13 April where Master of the Musicians’ Company Jeff Kelly gave out the awards.

Caetano impressed a panel of adjudicators including soprano Susan Bullock, pianist and teacher Professor Vanessa Latarche and opera critic and former managing director of the Barbican Centre, Sir Nicholas Kenyon to win a cash prize of £5,000 as well as a silver medal. Baritone Patrick Keefe was named winner of the Audience Prize of £500.

Established in 2004 to mark the former Prince of Wales’s enrolment as an Honorary Freeman of the Worshipful Company of Musicians in November 2003, the Prize invites applications from current winners of certain Company prizes and scholarships to compete to be recognized as ‘the most promising young instrumentalist or singer from the Company’s award winners’. The first round is judged from performances on recorded media before finalists compete publicly at a venue in London.

The Worshipful Company of Musicians provides over 60 scholarships, awards and prizes across all musical disciplines totaling over £250,000 each year to support emerging talent. Prizewinners join the Company’s young artists programme, with the opportunity to participate in an extensive outreach programme, bringing music to inner London schools with limited music provision.

Born in the Portuguese city of Coimbra, Gonçalo Maia Caetano started learning the guitar at the age of 7 at the Academia de Música de Pinhel, eventually going on to study at the Conservatório de Música S. José da Guarda then the Royal Academy of Music in London where he was supported by a Musicians' Company Award. Alongside last week’s win, Caetano’s accolades include first prize at the Grand Prize Virtuoso competition and second prize at Valencia’s International Guitar Competition as well as winning the Blyth Watson Guitar Concerto Prize at the Royal Academy of Music in 2012.