News and Events

featured events

Pepperdine Presents 2012 Parkening International Guitar Competition Winner Petrit Çeku

Guitarist Petrit Çeku will return to Pepperdine on Sunday, Mar. 3, for a performance that will conclude the 2012-13 Pepperdine University Center for the Arts Recital Series. Çeku’s performance will begin at 2 p.m. in Raitt Recital Hall, Malibu. 

The program will include Sonate Romantique by Manuel Ponce, two etudes by Giulio Regondi, Capriccio Diabolico by Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco, Homenaje pour "Le tombeau de Claude Debussy" by Manuel de Falla, and Five Bagatelles by William Walton.

Çeku has won first prize at numerous international guitar competitions, most recently the Parkening International Guitar Competition at Pepperdine University (2012), as well as the Michele Pittaluga in Alessandria, Italy (2007), Schadt Competition in Allentown, Pennsylvania (2011), and Maurizio Biasini in Bologna, Italy (2011).

He was born in Prizren, Kosovo, where he received instruction from guitarist Luan Sapunxhiu. In 2002 Çeku moved to Zagreb, Croatia, to study with Xhevdet Sahatxhija, and he later entered Darko Petrinjak's class at the Music Academy in Zagreb, where he graduated in 2008.

He has appeared throughout Europe and North America in solo recitals or accompanied by major symphonic orchestras such as the Allentown Symphony, Baltimore Symphony, Czech Chamber Philharmonic, Albanian Radio-Television Symphony Orchestra, State Hermitage Orchestra of St. Petersburg, Kosovo Philharmonic, and Zagreb Philharmonic. He has also made regular appearances with the Zagreb Soloists and is a founding member of the Elogio guitar trio.

Çeku's first CD was released in 2008 under the Naxos label. That same year he was awarded the annual prize of Zagreb Philharmonic Orchestra as Best Young Musician of the Year.

He currently studies with guitarist Manuel Barrueco at the Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore. Çeku plays a guitar made by Ross Gutmeier.

The 2012-2013 Pepperdine Recital Series, which features emerging artists, is sponsored by the Kwong family.

Limited tickets, priced at $25 for the public and $10 for full-time Pepperdine students, are available now by calling (310) 506-4522. Tickets are also available through Ticketmaster at (800) 982-2787.

For more information, visit the Center for the Arts website.