organizations

Artistic committee

MARTINA BATIČ
comes from Ajdovščina. After finishing the Organ School in Ljubljana and graduating in Music Pedagogy from the Academy of Music in Ljubljana, she studied choral conducting at the Munich Academy for Music, where she graduated in the class of Michael Gläser, and concluded her post-graduate studies with disctinction in 2005. She advanced her expertise in several master classes at home and abroad, also under the legendary Eric Ericson. As a pianist, she has collaborated with singers and received a number of awards (Chemnitz, Meran), and has performed with many notable Slovenian choirs as a choirmaster. Since 2004, she was the leader of the Ljubljana Opera Choir for five seasons. On a project basis, she cooperates with visible Slovenian choirs, among others the Chamber Choir of RTV Slovenia, and the Chamber Choir Ave, and has been a co-conductor of the Slovenian Children Choir. As a jury member, she often participates in Slovenian and international choral competitions, and is a valued lecturer at schools for choral conducting, classes and singing weeks at home as well as abroad. In Autumn of 2006, she won the first prize at the distinguished Eric Ericson Award international competition for conductors in Stockholm, opening the door to finest professional choirs. In recent seasons, she conducted the Bavarian Radio Chorus, the Vancouver Chamber Choir, the Stuttgart Vocal Ensemble, and twice the Swedish Radio Choir and the Eric Ericson Chamber Choir at the jubilee concert marking the 90th anniversary of composer Ingvar Lidholm. Since September 2009, Martina Batič is the artistic leader of the Slovenian Chamber Choir and the choral assistant to the director of the Slovenian Philharmonic.



AMBROŽ ČOPI
was born in Bovec. Having completed the Secondary Music and Ballet School in Ljubljana he went on to study composition and piano at the Academy of Music in Ljubljana and in 1996 graduated in the composition class of Dane Škerl; he completed his post-graduate studies in the class of Uroš Rojko. His compositions received awards at numerous composer competitions and are included on copyrighted CD’s: Lyrical Aquarelles / Lirični akvareli (by the Academic choir APZ Tone Tomšič, conducted by Stojan Kuret) and Birdies were still dreaming / So ptičice še snivale (ČarniCe, conductor Stojan Kuret), as well as on various CDs by national and foreign choirs. His compositions were published by the publishing houses Astrum, DSS, and Sulasol. For his outstanding achievements during his study Ambrož Čopi was awarded the Young Musician Award in 1995, in 1997 he won the Prešeren Prize of the University of Ljubljana and was upon merit awarded the Bovec Municipal Award in 1997.
Since 1999 he has been teaching at the Art Grammar School in Koper. He also conducts the Youth Mixed Choir of Art Grammar School Koper (1999-2002, 2007-), the Youth Mixed Choir of Conservatory of Music Ljubljana (2010-) and the Camerata Cantores (2011-), until 2007 he had conducted the Chamber Orchestra »Vladimir Lovec« (2005-2007). Already at the time of his study he founded the Chamber Choir Iskra Bovec (1992), he took the conductor’s position in the newly founded Nova Gorica Chamber Choir (Komorni zbor Nova Gorica) till 2004 and in the Mixed Choir Obala Koper (till 2007). Since 2004 he has been the conductor of the Academic Choir of the University of Primorska. The choirs brought him nine gold medals from national competitions, twelve first places and several gold awards from competitions abroad: the Grand Prix of Varna (Bulgaria, 2008), Tonen 2000 (the Netherlands, 2006), Prèveza (Greece 2003 and 2006), the »Franz Schubert« from Vienna (Austria, 2001), Cantonigròs (Spain, 2000 and 2011), Fortlauredale (the USA, 1999), Samobor (Croatia, 2011) and Ohrid (Macedonia, 2011). For his interpretations he was awarded several special prizes; he further received prizes for exceptional achievements with the choir, and was selected the best conductor of the competition. In 2009 he was awarded the Gold Medal of the University of Primorska for the achievements with the APZ UP choir.
As professional adjudicator and member of the competition juries he is regularly invited to various choral events and competitions, and as a lecturer he is involved in choral music seminars at home and abroad.

STOJAN KURET
graduated from conducting at the Ljubljana Academy of Music and finished piano studies at the Giuseppe Tartini Conservatory in Triest, where he lectures since 1983 as professor. While still a student (1974), he founded the youth choir of Glasbena matica Triest, then led the girls’ and mixed choirs, and re-founded the Jacobus Gallus choir in 1991. He received the Gallus commendation in 1984 for exceptional achievements in choral field. He has successfully collaborated with various orchestras as a guest conductor. From the 1992/93 season, he was the artistic leader and conductor of Tone Tomšič Academy Choir in Ljubljana for ten years. With them, as well as Ljubljana Vocal Academy, he achieved enviable international achievements: six grand prizes (Tours 1999, Varna 2001, Gorica 2001, Maribor 2002, Arezzo 2009, Vallée d'Aoste 2011), three performances in the finale for the Grand Prix of Europe, two of which were victorious – Arezzo in 2002 and Varna in 2010. He received the commendation of the City of Ljubljana in 2000, as well as the golden commendation of the Public Fund for Cultural Activities of the Republic of Slovenia for a creative direction of Tone Tomšič Academy Choir. He was the conductor of the RTV Slovenia Chamber Choir from January 2003 to April 2005, led the Slovenian Project Choir in 2003, and, since 2007, the Italian youth choir Coro Giovanile Italiano for two seasons. As a lecturer, he participates at choral seminars, choral festivals at home and abroad, and is a regular jury member at the most important international competitions. On a project basis, he also cooperates with the female vocal ensemble ČarniCe. He is the co-founder, artistic director and conductor of Ljubljana Vocal Academy, established in September 2008. For extraordinary achievements and contribution to choral music on a worldwide scale, he was awarded the prestigious Guidoneum Award 2011 in Arezzo, and the Prešeren Fund Award in 2012 for conducting achievements in choral music in the past two years.

DAMIJAN MOČNIK
lives in Cerklje, a small town in Upper Carniola, Slovenia. He completed his musical study at the Academy of Music in Ljubljana in 1991 (studio of Professor Dane Škerl) where he won the Prešeren Award for the outstanding student symphonic composition. He improved his knowledge of conducting by studying abroad, including coaching with famed Swedish conductor Eric Ericson.
Močnik is the choral conductor and music teacher at the Diocesan Classical Gimnazija in Ljubljana. Recipient of many awards at national and international choral competitions, his approach toward both conducting and music education is marked by passion and innovation. His two decades of conducting includes leadership of significant choral ensembles such as the France Prešeren Academy Choir from Kranj, Slovenia, and the Andrej Vavken Female Church Choir of Cerklje na Gorenjskem, Slovenia. With these two choirs he has won several awards at national and international choral competitions.
Močnik's compositional efforts are mainly devoted to the human voice. His musical language, inspired by carefully selected texts, is based on innovative rhythmic and melodic ideas. His melodies often reveal roots in plainchant or Slovenian folk music. Such fluid melodic concepts allow Močnik to create a variety of polyphonic, polytonal and polychordal structures in his choral scores.
His choral works have been preformed by choirs and vocal ensembles throughout the world, including The World Youth Choir (Gary Graden), The London Sinfonietta Voices (Terry Edwards), St. Jacob’s Chamber Choir Stockholm (Gary Graden), Singer Pur (Regensburg), Opus 7 (Seattle, USA), Chamber Choir Ave Ljubljana (Andraž Hauptman), APZ Tone Tomšič Ljubljana (Stojan Kuret), Missouri State Concert Chorale (Guy B. Webb), The Cardinal Singers of the University of Louisville (Kent Hatteberg), and many other choirs from Europe, USA, Japan and Taiwan.
Internationally, his scores are published by Augsburg-Fortress, Minneapolis / U.S.A., Carus-Verlag in Stuttgart / Germany, and Ferrimontana Publishing House in Frankfurt / Germany.

KARMINA ŠILEC
has brought freshness and originality to the world of vocal music, opening new spaces of expression, persuasiveness, intensity of experience, and communication. With “Choregie - vocal theatre” and its innovative interventions, she has opened wider artistic spaces and set trends towards complex multi-media events – productions performed on stages of international festivals and broadcast by the EBU and Eurovision.
As conductor she has projects with various ensembles: Carmina Slovenica Choir, the Radio Slovenia Symphony Orchestra, the Slovenian National Opera and ballet Maribor, the Slovenian National Project Choir, ensemble !Kebataola!, Orchestra Chorus Instrumentalis and many ensembles worldwide.
Karmina Šilec has received more than 20 of the highest and different special awards on International competitions, just to name some: she was awarded with the international Robert Edler Prize for Choral Music, received the Prešeren Fund award for the project “Vampirabile” and most recently an award by the ITI – International Theatre Institute "Music Theatre Now" in the category Music beyond opera.
She also works as an artistic adviser for choral music, gives lectures to conductors and is regularly a guest conductor, jury member or member of artistic committees at festivals and competitions. She teaches conducting at the University of Maribor and lectures at many universities around the world.
Karmina Šilec is the artistic director of Choregie – New Music Theatre, the international project Attacca, the Choregie aka Choregie festival for new music and the concert series Attacca. There are few artistic teams in Slovenia as widely recognizes in the international arena as can undoubtedly be said for the conductor Karmina Šilec’s outstanding ensemble Carmina Slovenica and ¡Kebataola!, together with the movements she created.