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Pija Hocevar

BEHIND THE CURTAIN

Part 4

In the summer of 2006, I attended my first seminar, Musica Loca, with Prof. Matej Zupan.
I had no idea what a seminar was, all I remember was that at home, like a little kitten, I earnestly, persistently and heartily begged for money to attend. Even though we were 4 children, none of us had a scholarship, because we had just passed the eligibility level. Funny thing is, we weren’t rich at all, far from it… Our father carefully invested his share in “his stuff”, so most of the rest of our needs had to be taken care of by our mother. You can imagine how hard it is to educate 4 children on 1 salary, but our mother is a supermother and to this day I still don’t know and can’t even imagine how she managed to do it all. 
In the end, I managed to “collect” the money for the registration, and I added some of my savings and actioooon. With a backpack much too big, I went to the seminar in Škofja Loka as a traveller. I could barely walk as I was swaying back and forth, and twice I even landed on my butt because my backpack was almost heavier than me… No matter, with the biggest smile on my face, I joined all the participants in the courtyard of the music school, where my musical journey began to take a steep climb upwards.


In that week, I managed to set the tone and the joy, pride and enthusiasm of doing so is indescribable.

I was so, so happy.
 
In the same week of my 1st seminar, I mentioned my desire to study at the Academy of Music in a conversation with my professor, who then referred me to the choice of two professors. Quite by chance, I chose a flutist who happened to be teaching closer to my home at the time. And I really couldn’t have chosen a better one than Vanja Ivanković.
So I added a 60 km round trip between the hills and valleys of Dolenjska to my high school during the week, and my mother had to pay the extra expenses and transport…

 

 

To be continued . . . 💛