Natalya Bing, violin

Natalya is a professional musician and educator living and working in Southern Lutruwita. 

She was born in Darkinjung Country on the Central Coast of New South Wales, to a Spanish-speaking Colombian/Australian family and began violin lessons aged 10 with Christopher Bearman. 

She studied with Susan Collins at Newcastle University, completing her BMus (honours) and later her MMus at the University of Tasmania. She has also studied violin privately with Peter Tanfield (Hobart) and Janet Davies (Sydney Conservatorium) along with Alexander Technique for many years.

In 2017, the University of Tasmania awarded her the D & MV McDonald Scholarship for Strings, funding a three-month intensive study trip to England where she studied with Felix Andrievsky and Itzhak Rashkovsky at the Royal College of Music, London and privately with David Takeno (Guildhall school of Music & Drama).

In 2017, She completed her Master of Music exploring the lost art of violin improvisation in Western classical music through a combination of early music sources and practice techniques used in 20th century jazz playing. 

Her passion for improvisation has led her into both early and contemporary music directions.

In 2022, Natalya began specialising in early music, studying Baroque violin with Julia Fredersdorff and performing with Van Diemen’s Band as part of their Fellowship program. In 2023, with the support of VDB donors and the Regional Arts Fund, she travelled to Europe to study at academies with Sophie Gent and Ensemble Masques at the Stage de Musique Ancienne in Cluny, France and with Enrico Gatti and Ryo Terakado at Urbino Musica Antica in Italy.

As a noise artist, improviser, and composer, she collaborates with sonic and visual artist Joshua Santospirito, as Bing/Santospirito. Together, they create large-scale audio-visual works on electric and acoustic instruments presented at Mona Foma festival (2021, 2023) and Theatre Royal, Hobart (2024, 2026).

She performs regularly at MONA - Museum of Old and New Art (Hobart), as a casual violinist for the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra, and has performed with artists such as Olafúr Arnalds, Bruce Springsteen, Michael Bublé, Steve Smyth, Jack Colwell and for numerous festivals such as The Unconformity Festival (Queenstown), Melbourne Festival, Sydney Festival, Vivid Festival, Blues and Roots Festival (Byron Bay). 

Her hobbies include playing drums and keys in Hobart punk/jazz band ‘Warner, Smith & Bancroft’, surfing, snorkelling, gardening and playing video games.