Expressions by Siphiwe Mhlambi
A photographic tribute to the women who shaped South African jazz
Standard Bank Joy of Jazz 2026, 25 and 26 September, Sandton Convention Centre
View the catalogueWomen have always had voices. The question is whether the world has made room to hear the fullness of them.
Her Voice draws from Siphiwe Mhlambi’s photographic archive to honour women whose artistry has shaped South African jazz across generations.
The catalogue provides factual context for each photograph while deliberately leaving the images open to the viewer’s own encounter and interpretation.
No. 1Siya “Jazzmatic” Charles
No. 2Dr Sibongile Khumalo
No. 3Nomfundo Xaluva
No. 4Miriam Makeba
No. 5Titi Luzipo
No. 6Putuma Tiso (Pu2ma)
No. 7Msaki
No. 8Lira (Lerato Molapo)
No. 9Camagwini
No. 10Indwe
No. 11Busi Mhlongo
No. 12Tu Nokwe
No. 13Lu Dlamini
No. 14Simphiwe Dana
No. 15Abigail Kubheka, Dorothy Masuka, Sathima Bea Benjamin, Thandi Klaasen and Sylvia Mdunyelwa
No. 16Dorothy Masuka and Tribute “Birdie” Mboweni
No. 17Thandiswa Mazwai and Oumou Sangaré
No. 1
2018
Siya “Jazzmatic” Charles photographed during a performance at The Orbit – Home of Jazz in Braamfontein, Johannesburg, on 13 March 2018. A trombonist, composer and arranger, she has appeared at the venue across a range of performances, both as a featured artist and alongside leading South African jazz musicians.
No. 2
2017
Dr Sibongile Khumalo photographed during her three-day 60th birthday concert series, More Than 3 Faces, at the Market Theatre in Newtown, Johannesburg, in September 2017. Conceived as a retrospective of her extraordinary career, the series revisited the breadth of her artistry across African classical music, jazz and musical legacy, culminating in a tribute evening in which a younger generation of South African vocalists interpreted her music back to her.
No. 3
2017
Nomfundo Xaluva photographed during a performance at The Orbit – Jazz Club & Bistro in Braamfontein, Johannesburg. One of her notable appearances there took place on 15 March 2017 as part of The Orbit’s third anniversary celebrations. Her work at the venue reflected her distinctive blend of contemporary jazz, classical structure and Xhosa musical heritage.
No. 4
2006
Miriam Makeba photographed during a NAFCOC gala dinner at Sun City, held during the organisation’s annual congress in July 2006. These major mid-2000s gatherings brought together prominent business, political and civic leaders, and her appearance formed part of an event celebrating Black economic advancement alongside South African cultural excellence.
No. 5
2016
Titi Luzipo photographed during her headline debut performance at The Orbit – Home of Jazz in Braamfontein, Johannesburg, on 25 May 2016. The concert opened her national tour for Songs My Mother Taught Me and honoured the South African songbook she inherited from her mother, vocalist Vuyelwa Qwesha.
No. 6
2010
Putuma Tiso photographed during the 2010 Standard Bank Joy of Jazz in the Newtown Precinct, Johannesburg, where she emerged as a breakout Afro-jazz artist. During this period she also performed alongside Hugh Masekela, including work connected to a tribute to Miriam Makeba.
No. 7
2024
Msaki photographed during her sold-out Camagu in Symphony concert at the SunBet Arena in Pretoria on 12 December 2024. The performance celebrated ten years of her music career.
No. 8
2019
Lira photographed during the Tribute to Women event at Emmarentia Botanical Gardens in Johannesburg on 10 August 2019, shortly after the unveiling of a one-of-a-kind Barbie doll created in her likeness as part of Mattel’s 60th-anniversary global campaign celebrating female role models.
No. 9
2010
Camagwini photographed during a live tribute to Busi Mhlongo at the Playhouse Theatre in Durban, KwaZulu-Natal, in 2010, shortly before Busi Mhlongo passed away on 15 June 2010.
No. 10
2015
Indwe photographed during a performance at the Moshito Music Conference and Exhibition. Signed to Native Rhythms, she appeared as part of the label’s showcase of indigenous and Afro-soul talent, including a performance at Moshito’s Opening Concert at the SABC M1 Studio in Johannesburg on 9 September 2015.
No. 11
1999
Busi Mhlongo photographed during the live launch of Urban Zulu at the Mega Music Warehouse in Newtown, Johannesburg, on 20 February 1999. The performance marked the South African live debut of an album that had already achieved major international success.
No. 12
2011
Tu Nokwe photographed during a Standard Bank Joy of Jazz performance in 2011, when the festival was held across venues in Newtown, Johannesburg. A composer, guitarist and vocalist, her work is rooted in South African musical heritage and is known for weaving Afro-jazz, storytelling and cultural memory into performance.
No. 13
2016
Lu Dlamini photographed during a performance at The Orbit – Home of Jazz in Johannesburg, during the Forest Jam Southern Africa Tour in February 2016. A vocalist and multi-instrumentalist, she is pictured in performance on the musical bow, bringing together voice, rhythm and traditional instrumentation within a contemporary jazz setting.
No. 14
2023
Simphiwe Dana photographed during The Off White Concert at the Big Top Arena, Carnival City, Brakpan, on 25 November 2023.
No. 15
2013
The five artists photographed at the SABC M1 Studios in Auckland Park on 11 August 2013, where they were honoured by the Standard Bank Joy of Jazz with Lifetime Achievement Awards recognising their multi-decade contributions to South African music and jazz heritage.
No. 16
Dorothy Masuka and Afro-soul artist Tribute “Birdie” Mboweni photographed during a Moshito Music Conference and Exhibition performance built around the theme “Youth Meets Aged”. Their appearance brought together a South African music legend and a younger contemporary artist in a symbolic passing of the musical torch. Their shared performance of Masuka’s classic MaGumede followed Mboweni’s recording of the song.
No. 17
2025
Thandiswa Mazwai joined Oumou Sangaré for a surprise collaborative performance at the Standard Bank Joy of Jazz at the Sandton Convention Centre in Johannesburg. Sharing the stage on the festival’s closing evening, 28 September 2025, they performed Saa Magni in a memorable cross-continental duet.
Twenty more photographs, available on the same terms.
Her Voice is presented in the year marking the 70th anniversary of the 1956 Women’s March, a moment remembered for the thousands of women who gathered at the Union Buildings in Pretoria to protest the extension of pass laws to African women.
But the women of 1956 did not suddenly find their voices on that day.
Long before the march, women were already speaking, organising, caring, working, praying, saving, resisting and building community. The march created a moment in which the country could no longer ignore them.
That understanding became the starting point for looking at Siphiwe Mhlambi’s photographs.
The aim was never to make the women in the archive fit the history of 1956. It was to allow the photographs to speak back to it.
And what emerged was a much fuller idea of what a woman’s voice can be.
Her voice may be commanding, but it may also be quiet. It may carry grief, joy, tenderness, mastery, longing, stillness, intimacy or delight. It may be heard through song, through an instrument, through the body, through companionship, or simply through presence.
The women photographed here do not have to reproduce the struggle of those who came before them in order to honour them.
Inheritance is not imitation. It is receiving something that makes your own voice possible.
Perhaps that is where the connection to 1956 becomes most meaningful. One generation fought, organised, risked and imagined. Another inherits not a script to repeat, but more room from which to become.
Her Voice is therefore not about women finding their voices.
Women have always had voices. The question is whether the world has made room to hear the fullness of them.
This exhibition asks us to make that room.
Curated by Dr Boniswa Siwundla
Photography by Siphiwe Mhlambi
Siphiwe Mhlambi is a Johannesburg jazz and documentary photographer. Self-taught, he began at the Sowetan in the late 1980s and has been the official photographer of the Standard Bank Joy of Jazz for more than twenty-five years. Her Voice is drawn from that archive.
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