Andraž Malgaj, accordion

Mia Kristan, percussion
Ana Semič Bursać, piano

Programme:
G. F. Händel: Suite No 7 in G minor, HWV 432
U. Rojko: Tango No. 3 and 4
V. Žuraj: Silhouette
***
C. C. Lin: Kaleidoscope
E. Sejourne: Avalanche
J. Schwantner: Velocities

Accordionist Andraž Malgaj is a third-year undergraduate student at the Ljubljana Academy of Music, where he studies with Luka Juhart. He has won numerous prizes at regional, national and international competitions both as a soloist and as a member of chamber ensembles. He has won two gold plaques and two silver plaques (for second and third prizes) at the national TEMSIG (Young Musicians of Slovenia) competition. He has twice won gold plaques at the international accordion competition in Moravske Toplice (2009, 2010) and has also won a silver plaque at the international accordion competition in Beltinci. In 2014 he won his category as a soloist at the Svirél International Music Competition, receiving a gold diploma, and repeated the feat a year later as a member of a chamber ensemble. In 2019 he received a gold plaque and a first prize in the highest category at the international accordion competition PannoniAccordion. He gives solo concerts every year in Velenje, Laško and Celje and has performed in the Zvokotok and Listening at the Opera cycles, at the Summer in Celje festival (2019) and at the Festival on the Ljubljanica. He regularly attends seminars and masterclasses with noted accordion teachers such as Claudia Buder, Roman Pechmann, Mie Miki, Hugo Noth, Iñaki Alberdi and Corrado Rojac.

Mia Kristan had her first encounter with percussion at Tolmin Music School. After completing the lower music school programme there, she continued her musical training at the Arts Gymnasium in Koper under the guidance of Mitja Tavčar. She has given solo performances in her hometown Tolmin, in Koper and in Postojna. She is a member of the Tolmin Wind Orchestra, with which she performed her first orchestral solo. In 2016 she was chosen by Tolmin Music School to perform with an ad hoc symphony orchestra at a gala concert marking the bicentenary of public music education in Slovenia. In 2019, as part of her secondary education, she took part in a joint project with a secondary music school from Poland, resulting in the premiere performance of a ballet. That year she also had the opportunity to play with the Slovenian Army Orchestra at a concert marking Koper Music School’s 70th anniversary. While a student, she has taken part in numerous regional, national and international competitions. In 2020 she won a first prize and gold plaque at the national TEMSIG (Young Musicians of Slovenia) competition, having already won a third prize and gold plaque at the same competition in 2017. In 2019 she took part in the Concorso Musicale Internazionale Città di Palmanova (Italy), winning a primo premio assoluto. She has attended summer schools for soloists and orchestral percussionists and attended masterclasses with teachers from Slovenia and abroad (Claus Hessler, Fabián Pérez Tedesco, Petra Vidmar, Tatiana Koleva, Tchiki Duo and Rainer Römer). She has also made studio recordings and is currently preparing her first album.

Ana Semič Bursać completed her secondary music education under the mentorship of Prof. Hinko Haas, later graduating cum laude from the Academy of Music in Ljubljana in the class of Prof. Emeritus Dubravka Tomšič-Srebotnjak, then going on to complete her master’s degree in 2016 at the City of Basel Music Academy in the class of Prof. Tobias Schabenberger. Her work has earned her a Škerjanc Prize and a Prešeren Prize at the Academy of Music in Ljubljana, and after completing her studies she worked for some time as a teaching assistant and accompanist at the Ljubljana Academy of Music. She is currently employed as a piano teacher at the Ljubljana Conservatory of Music and Ballet. She regularly performs concerts solo and in various chamber groups.