Naomi Okuda Wooderson (recorder) and friends

Naomi Okuda studied modern flute at the Osaka College of Music in Japan. After graduation she became interested in early music and studied recorder under Pamela Thorby at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama (the postgraduate early music course) in London. She also studied recorder with Piers Adams and baroque flute and baroque studies with Stephen Preston. After graduation from the GSMD, she returned to Japan and has performed widely as a baroque music specialist ever since, giving recitals, playing with orchestras such as Bach Collegium Japan, and recording for NHK. She was one of the recommended artists of Osaka City in 2003.

In 2010, Naomi moved permanently to the UK, where she continues to develop her performing career and teaches recorder at Wellington College and privately. She has taught the Advanced Baroque Recorder Course at Benslow Music Trust, Morley College and Blackheath Conservatoire. Naomi has given solo recitals and recordings and teaches actively in both the UK and Japan. She has made a number of recordings, and her solo CD ‘Airs Anglois’ was released to considerable critical acclaim in the Japanese and English musical press. And also a CD, 'Shakespeare's Music', from the Hamamatsu Museum of Musical Instruments (Japan), on which Naomi is one of the principal players, has received the highest critical acclaim in 'The Record Geijutsu', the principal Japanese music journal.