Page 164 - Glasbenopedagoški zbornik Akademije za glasbo v Ljubljani / The Journal of Music Education of the Academy of Music in Ljubljana: Mostovi med formalnim in neformalnim glasbenim izobraževanjem, leto 15, zvezek 31 / Year 15, Issue 31, 2019
P. 164
SBENOPEDAGOŠKI ZBORNIK, 31. zvezek
Introduction
Montenegro has not such a long tradition of music education as many European and
neighboring countries. It was institutionalized only after the II World War, when first
music schools were founded. The foundation of music schools in the war-ravaged country
experiencing the lack of professional staff was mostly initiated by foreigners who at the
time accidentally or deliberately happened to be in Montenegro. One of those foreigners
was Vida Matjan – a Slovenian, who had great influence on the development of music
education in Montenegro and whose character and work this paper is dedicated to. The
spectrum of her activity is wide. As a music pedagogue, she founded a Private Music
School Vida Matjan in Kotor in 1945. She dealt with ethnomusicology and was an
innovator in solfeggio teaching while as a creator she composed a number of musical
fairytales which performance was utterly adapted to children’s performing abilities. To
my knowledge, her work was not well-known in the country of her origin – Slovenia, so
this may be an opportunity to pay her due respect in her homeland as well.
Vida Matjan’s Life Path
Vida Matjan, born Hribar, a Slovenian, was born in Ljubljana in 1896. Her father Franc
was a graphic worker, her mother Antonia, born Uèak, a musician who completed
Glasbena matica and solo-singing in particular, thus having great influence on Vida’s
interests. Already in her earliest youth, she expressed her desire for music education, but
her father opposed. Consequently, Vida became a gymnasium student. Having completed
the third grade of gymnasium in 1911, Vida brought home a booklet with excellent grades.
Asked by her parents what she wanted as reward for such success, she replied –piano
studies only. Her father agreed and Vida started her studies at Glasbena matica with
professor Vaclav Talich, Vida Prelesnik, Jaroslava Chlumecki and finally professor
Anton Trost - in parallel to attending gymnasium. Wishing to compensate for the time lost,
she initiated her studies with great enthusiasm and energy, owing to which she succeeded
to skip two years of regular schooling at Glasbena matica. She was even exempt from
paying tuition fee. In 1914 she received a scholarship for Vienna Music Academy, for
which she was being prepared by the professor Trost.
At that time the significant influence on Vida Matjan interests was made by Marija
Kmetova, a writer, who gathered children and staged performances in her home. It was
where Vida Matjan gained first precious experiences in acting and directing which would
prove important later on during her work in Music School in Kotor. In order to understand
her versatile personality it is important to mention that she also took part in various sports
– skating, swimming and hiking.
Those were also the times when severe war events took place. The beginning of the I
World War prevented her studies in Vienna. During the war, in 1917, she married Alojz
Matjan, an engineering student and a good organist, pianist and amateur painter. It is
particularly important to highlight that their house on the outskirts of Ljubljana was often
visited by the company of the most significant names of Slovenian culture: the writer Ivan
Cankar, the sculptor Lojze Dolinar, the painter Anton Gojmir Kos, the composer and
pianist Lucijan Marija Škerjanc. There were discussions on different important topics
162
Introduction
Montenegro has not such a long tradition of music education as many European and
neighboring countries. It was institutionalized only after the II World War, when first
music schools were founded. The foundation of music schools in the war-ravaged country
experiencing the lack of professional staff was mostly initiated by foreigners who at the
time accidentally or deliberately happened to be in Montenegro. One of those foreigners
was Vida Matjan – a Slovenian, who had great influence on the development of music
education in Montenegro and whose character and work this paper is dedicated to. The
spectrum of her activity is wide. As a music pedagogue, she founded a Private Music
School Vida Matjan in Kotor in 1945. She dealt with ethnomusicology and was an
innovator in solfeggio teaching while as a creator she composed a number of musical
fairytales which performance was utterly adapted to children’s performing abilities. To
my knowledge, her work was not well-known in the country of her origin – Slovenia, so
this may be an opportunity to pay her due respect in her homeland as well.
Vida Matjan’s Life Path
Vida Matjan, born Hribar, a Slovenian, was born in Ljubljana in 1896. Her father Franc
was a graphic worker, her mother Antonia, born Uèak, a musician who completed
Glasbena matica and solo-singing in particular, thus having great influence on Vida’s
interests. Already in her earliest youth, she expressed her desire for music education, but
her father opposed. Consequently, Vida became a gymnasium student. Having completed
the third grade of gymnasium in 1911, Vida brought home a booklet with excellent grades.
Asked by her parents what she wanted as reward for such success, she replied –piano
studies only. Her father agreed and Vida started her studies at Glasbena matica with
professor Vaclav Talich, Vida Prelesnik, Jaroslava Chlumecki and finally professor
Anton Trost - in parallel to attending gymnasium. Wishing to compensate for the time lost,
she initiated her studies with great enthusiasm and energy, owing to which she succeeded
to skip two years of regular schooling at Glasbena matica. She was even exempt from
paying tuition fee. In 1914 she received a scholarship for Vienna Music Academy, for
which she was being prepared by the professor Trost.
At that time the significant influence on Vida Matjan interests was made by Marija
Kmetova, a writer, who gathered children and staged performances in her home. It was
where Vida Matjan gained first precious experiences in acting and directing which would
prove important later on during her work in Music School in Kotor. In order to understand
her versatile personality it is important to mention that she also took part in various sports
– skating, swimming and hiking.
Those were also the times when severe war events took place. The beginning of the I
World War prevented her studies in Vienna. During the war, in 1917, she married Alojz
Matjan, an engineering student and a good organist, pianist and amateur painter. It is
particularly important to highlight that their house on the outskirts of Ljubljana was often
visited by the company of the most significant names of Slovenian culture: the writer Ivan
Cankar, the sculptor Lojze Dolinar, the painter Anton Gojmir Kos, the composer and
pianist Lucijan Marija Škerjanc. There were discussions on different important topics
162
