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MAKUDU SENAOANA
TENOR
BIOGRAPHY
South African tenor Makudu Senaoana is steadily making his mark throughout Europe and North America as a gifted and versatile performer. Recently, Senaoana made a return to the Dutch National Opera for their Be Opera project, covered Rinuccio in San Diego Opera’s production of Gianni Schicchi and performed the same role with Opera Steamboat. He workshopped a new piece with On Site Opera, and featured prominently in Opera Ithaca’s festival, performing in their productions of Nabucco (Ismaele), Highway 1, USA (Nate), and Proving Up (Miles Zegner). Senaoana enjoys a close relationship with director William Kentridge, with whom he toured South Africa and the U.S. in performances of The Head and the Load, a genre-defying experience centered around Africans in WWI, initially commissioned in part by the Park Avenue Armory. He also joined Opera Theatre of Saint Louis as Remus in Treemonisha and he made his Carnegie Hall début with the Cecilia Chorus as the tenor soloist for Beethoven’s Christ on the Mount of Olives and the world premiere of Cyrus Chestnut’s Power in the Blood. Previously, Makudu made his début with the Dutch National Opera in the world premiere of Anansi by South African composer Neo Muyanga and the opera house’s Celebrating Diversity: Black Achievement Month. Senaoana also performed as second Jew in Salome with Tulsa Opera.
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Senaoana has performed extensively with Cape Town Opera, recently in Monteverdi’s Vespers as well as a gala concert, and he’s been heard in concert with the one and only Bryn Terfel with the Cape Town Philharmonic Orchestra as part of the South African Wagner Society. While residing in Germany, he gave performances with both the Aalto-Musiktheater Essen and Theater Aachen as Tom Rakewell in The Rake’s Progress, Almaviva in Il barbiere di Siviglia, Tamino in Die Zauberflöte, Don Ottavio in Don Giovanni, Nathanaël in Les contes d’Hoffmann, and Belfiore in Il viaggio a Reims.
An alumnus of the Young Artist Program at the Glimmerglass Festival, Senaoana débuted on the main stage of Alice Busch Theater as Absalom Kumalo in Kurt Weill’s Lost in the Stars while covering Le Chevalier Danois in Jean Baptiste Lully’s Armide. He also participated in Houston Grand Opera’s Young Artists Vocal Academy and Ravinia Festival’s Program for Singers at the Steans Music Institute. Senaoana has enjoyed considerable success in the competition circuit, having won the main prize and the Schubert song prize at Voices of South Africa International Opera Competition, the Johannesburg International Mozart Festival’s International Study Award, and the Olitalia/Rialto Study Award, as well as third prize in the 2020 editions of the Giovanni Consiglio International Competition and the Operatic Grand Prix of Romania.
Originally from Johannesburg, Makudu Senaoana is a graduate of the renowned Drakensberg Boys Choir School and the South African College of Music at the University of Cape Town. There, he studied voice under the guidance of Hanna van Niekerk and Professor Kamal Khan, and performed in his first operas included the role of Tom Rakewell in The Rake’s Progress with UCT Opera.
Current as of September 1, 2025