Music Masters Students Recital

• Belinda de Villiers - Pianist
• Peter Cartwright  - Pianist
• Viktor van Niekerk - Ten-String Guitar
• Ziza Mhlongo -  Vocalist

Belinda de Villiers - Pianist 
Belinda de Villiers graduated from the University of Port Elizabeth in 1994 with a Bachelor of Music (Cum Laude) degree in Piano Performance, and the Higher Diploma of Education (post-graduate). Belinda is an accomplished pianist, both as a soloist and as an accompanist, and also has extensive experience working with Choirs, Jazz Bands, Marimba Bands and Concert Wind Bands, and directing musicals. She has performed as a soloist, accompanist, and conductor at venues such as the Baxter Theatre, V&A Waterfront, and City Hall in Cape Town, the Port Elizabeth Opera House and Feathermarket Hall, the Linder Auditorium in Johannesburg, and at the National Youth Jazz Festival in Grahamstown. Belinda was the Director of the Cape Town Male Voice Choir for 2 years. She has produced and directed large-scale Musical productions such as Grease, Oklahoma, Annie, and Little Shop of Horrors, to name a few. In the field of Music Education, Belinda has held the positions of Head of Music at Sans Souci Girls’ High School and Pinelands High School in Cape Town, and Director of Music and Drama at St David’s Marist Inanda in Sandton. She is currently freelancing as an accompanist, piano teacher, and marimba band coach while completing the Master of Music degree in Piano Performance at WITS University. 

Peter Cartwright  - Pianist                                                                                          
Peter Cartwright completed his Bachelor of Music Degree, with Distinction, at Rhodes University, studying piano with Mariel Ilusorio. While at Rhodes, he won the Grahamstown Music Competition (2008) and the Mavis Hill Competition (2009). In 2009 he performed with members of the Odeion String Quartet and played solo recitals in Grahamstown and Hogsback, and chamber concerts in the United States of America. He performed in chamber concerts as part of the Grahamstown National Arts Festival in June 2010. In the same year he attended the prestigious Tel-Hai International Piano Master-classes in Israel, studying with internationally renowned teachers Phillip Kawin and Asaf Zohar.

Peter was selected as one of five pianists from South Africa to participate in the second round of the 2010 ATKV Muziq Classical Music Competition. He was chosen as one of The Investec Rhodes Top 100 Students in the category Arts, Culture and Media. Peter performs as pianist for the vocal duo Shirilaulu which completed a successful tour of Zimbabwe in December 2010.

Peter is currently studying towards his Master of MusicDegree in piano performance at the University of the Witwatersrand, with Malcolm Nay and Pauline Nossel. Hehas performed twice at the WakkerstroomMusic Festival, as well as appearing as soloist with the Johannesburg Festival Orchestra in Botswana. He has played solo and chamber recitals in Johannesburg, and a solo recital in Durban. Peter works as an accompanist and assistant concert organiser at WITS.

Peter has worked in master-classes with several international musicians, including Christopher Elton, Anton Nel,Margarita Shevchenko, Kotaro Fukuma, and Renee Reswick.

In addition to numerous performances, Peter maintains a high academic standard. At Rhodes he was selected onto the Dean’s List for Academic Merit, and was awarded Honours for Academics. 

Viktor van Niekerk - Ten-String Guitar
Viktor van Niekerk is a conscious artist, with a total understanding of the ten-string guitar as envisioned by NarcisoYepes." Fritz Buss, 2007

"When his fingers glide across the ten strings, it is with the same finesse and flair as an Olympic athlete in action." (Rapport, 5 Sep. 2008, p. 3.)
Viktor Van Niekerk was born in 1981, in Johannesburg, and educated in South Africa and Australia. As an artist, he is involved with music performance, visual art, research, writing and teaching. He adopted the ten-string guitar at the age of fourteen. Soon after, he chose for his teacher Fritz Buss, a top disciple of the legendary ten-string guitarist Narciso Yepes.
He continued his studies with Buss for over 12 years, winning top prizes at guitar competitions in South Africa and performing in various concert venues, including the National Arts Festival. He has also performed at festivals in Asia and Australia. He had additional performance lessons from Bruno Brys (conductor) and, in Australia, from Dr Florian Messner (musicologist). Presently, he is reading for a Master of Music at Wits, producing an anthology of baroque lute music transcribed for the ten-string guitar, under the guidance of Fritz Buss, composer Jeanne Zaidel-Rudolph, and pianist Malcolm Nay. In addition, he has recently completed an extensive exercise and repertoire book for beginning ten-string guitarists.
Composers who have written for or dedicated works to him include Bob Dickinson (UK), Florian Messner (Australia), Fritz Buss, and David Hoenigsberg. He is also webmaster/author of tenstringguitar.INFO (the officially endorsed web presence of the ten-string guitar as designed by Narciso Yepes).

Ziza Mhlongo -  Vocalist
Ziza studied music at the University of Witwatersrand and in 1996 completed her BMUS (Bachelor of music) degree in ‘Performance and individual teaching’ majoring in Classical singing. Ziza’s taste in music however always spread widely. Her performances today include music of both contemporary and classical genre.

Soon after the completion of her music degree Ziza started up her private ‘School of Singing’. This studio is still running today, on a much smaller capacity, due to her many other commitments. She also teaches vocals at Wits University, and the Ridge school in Westcliff.

In 1994, Ziza ‘teemed up’ with the force of two D.Js and begun performing with the two as a trio called ‘Suplex’at a well known Jo’burg ‘hang-out’, club ‘206’. The trio is still active today; performing what would be classified as ‘dance music’.  They have performed on several occasions at the ‘South African fashion week’ events as part of a well known ‘Black Coffee’ fashion house showing. Her other collaborations include a ‘Jazzy/Lounge’music experiment with a producer/engineer Garth van der Merwe.One of their original compositions can be heard on a local CD compilation ‘Cape town 2am’published by ‘Sheer music’.  Her collaboration with one of S.A’s Dance Music pioneers, Gary van Riet created a project called ‘Musique des Anges’. Its idea was to ‘merge’ Classical music (singing) with more contemporary, electronic music. Their first release can be heard on a South African compilation ‘Liquid lounge’ (‘Next music’, 2006) featuring some international names like ‘Moby’.  As a Jazz quartet/trio/duo, Ziza has performed with some of S.A’s top musicians like Johnny Furie, Wessel van Rendsburg, Godfrey Mcina, Carlo Mombeli, Reza Khota, Jonathan Crossley, Russell Stirling, and Marcus Wyatt. Today Ziza manages her time between studying, performing, recording and composing music. She a vocal student of Eugenie Chopin as well as a Jazz piano student of Theodora Drummond