News

The Stellenbosch University Chamber Choir (SUCC), has just returned from a hugely successful tour to Hong Kong. The choir was invited as Artist Choir in Residence to the 2017 World Youth & Children’s Choir Festival which took place from 17-22 July 2017. An invitation of this nature can be considered both a great and rare honour.

The World Youth and Children’s Choir Festival is one of the most important choral festivals in the world, and attracts 200 participating choirs from across the globe. SUCC’s concerts were listened to by around 5000 participants and performances were live-streamed worldwide.

Founded and conducted by Martin Berger, this young ensemble has developed into one of South Africa’s leading chamber choirs: internationally respected and locally relevant. With the diversity of its repertoire, SUCC represents the variety of choral music styles to be found in the country.

The choir performed at the Opening Ceremony of the festival on 18 July, a full evening concert on 19 July and also at the 20^th Anniversary Celebration Concert of the establishment of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region.  All performances were received with overwhelming enthusiasm from the audience.

SUCC was honoured by the presence and support of the South African Consul-General to Hong Kong, Mr Madoda Ntshinga, at both the Opening Ceremony and the full evening concert. He commended the choir on “…raising the South African flag even much higher as true ambassadors of our country.”

During a prestigious event on Saturday 29 July in Parow, Cape Town, 24-year old pianist Sulayman Human was named overall winner of the national instrumental classical music competition, ATKV-Muziq.

ATKV-Muziq, the biggest and most prestigious classical music competition in Southern Africa, with previous winners including international award-winning pianist Ben Schoeman and Megan-Geoffrey Prins, is an annual contribution of the ATKV towards classical music in South Africa. This is a national classical music competition for young musicians between the ages of 15 and 27, with a total prize money of R180 000 awarded to the winners.

Sulayman, currently a Masters student at the University of Stellenbosch, won the Overall Prize of R65 000. An additional prize of R8 500 for the Best Interpretation of a Baroque or Classical work during the Final Round was also awarded to Sulayman for his rendition Mozart’s  Sonata no. 10 in C major, K330; III. Allegretto.

The overall second prize of R32 000 was awarded to Cameron Williams (saxophone) and the overall third prize of R16 000 was awarded to Jeffrey Armstrong (violin).

An additional prize of R8 500 for the Best Interpretation of a South African Composition during the Second Round was awarded to Cameron Williams for his rendition of

1. Stephenson’s Introduction and Allegro.

Young adult musicians across Southern Africa were invited to participate in the first round in May this year. The top ten candidates were chosen to take part in the second round.  Five finalists were then chosen at the end of the second round to participate in the final round. The remainder of the five finalists (besides Sulayman, Cameron and Jeffrey) were Brain Bae (piano) and Jonathan Mayer (violin), who also performed during the final round.

The Afrikaans national radio station, RSG, was the media partner of ATKV-Muziq this year.

Award-winning South African pianist Megan-Geoffrey Prins will present a free solo recital on Friday, 28 July at 20:00 in the Endler Hall at Stellenbosch University’s (SU) Music Department. The concert will be preceded by public master classes from 14:00 to 17:00, also hosted by the SU Music Department.

Prins is currently studying towards a Doctor of Musical Arts degree at the Cleveland Institute of Music in the USA, where he completed his Master’s degree under famed pianist Antonio Pompa-Baldi. Last year, Prins won the ATKV Muziq Instrumental Competition. In 2015, he won the Fifth UNISA National Piano Competition and the inaugural Stellenbosch International Chamber Music Festival Competition. The Cleveland Institute of Music recently awarded him the Sadie Zellen Piano Prize and the coveted Maurice and Judith Kaplow Prize for Uncommon Creativity.

Throughout his Master’s and Doctorate degree studies, Prins relied on the Oppenheimer Memorial Trust, the National Arts Council of South Africa, private sponsors, and online fundraising campaigns to fund his studies. He hopes to raise enough money to complete his final year of doctoral studies before he returns to the USA at the end of August 2017.

“I’ve been overwhelmed by the emotional and financial support I’ve received throughout my studies,” says Prins. “I’m delighted that the SU Music Department is hosting this free concert. It is an opportunity for me to thank all those who have supported me so far and I will be able to update guests on my current fundraising progress.”

In the first half of the recital, Prins will perform works by Joseph Haydn, Frédéric Chopin, and South African composer Graham Newcater. The second half will feature selections from Sergei Lyapunov’s 12 Etudes d`Exécution Transcendante. For more information, please visit Prins’ website at www.megangeoffreyprins.com.