BERNICE WEST ON LOVE, LIVE MUSIC AND COFFEE
Since her hit album Net Geleen gave us a string of number ones, including a track that was top of the Apple Music charts for ten months, this pride of North-West province is becoming embraced by a nation.
The runner up of KykNET reality show Maak my Famous (Make me famous), Bernice West has been making remarkable moves since her 2019 breakthrough in the music industry.
West was part of the Rusternburg High school choir that caused a buzz on social media in 2019 when they paid tribute to the legendary Freddie Mercury with a breathtaking performance of Bohemian Rhapsody.
Her 2020 album Net Gelee was nominated for a SAMA in 2021 under the category Best Contemporary Album (Beste kontemporere Musiek Album), making her the youngest Afrikaans artist nominated for a SAMA.
Recently, she performed in Thabazimbi and took to Instagram about how amazing it is to be able to do live performances again and to be performing with a band.
“‘n Live show is net n vibe as jy daar is! Dis amazing om weer te kan live jol en die keer met n band,” she exclaimed on social media.
The North-West born singer and songwriter recently got engaged to scriptwriter Jannes Erasmus. Erasmus was also the director of the 2022 musical, Die Gelofte: n Musiekblyspel to which Bernice was a cast of.
The couple, together with Pretoria artist Renier Van der Westhuizen is set to open a new coffee shop called West Café.
“Ek is baie life vir live music, ek is verlief op koffie en ek is mal oor baie lekker kos. Dit is nie altyd iets wat n mens op een plek op die selfde tyd kry nie.”
West Café is set to sell coffee, pastry, ice-cream and there will definitely be live performances every now and then.
To Bernice, faith and having good people around her are central to her success and musical inspiration, and the message behind her new album Jona, is that one can be afraid to live out one’s true calling but peace is only found in accepting it.
The day Bernice’s music goes international, making both Afrikaans and English speaking fans and all of South Africa proud seems only a matter of time.
