Ognjen Popović & Mirjana Rajić
Biography Ognjen Popović & Mirjana Rajić
Mirjana Rajic
Born in Belgrade, Mirjana Rajić studied under the legendary pianist Lazar Berman in Weimar and in Imola, Italy, in Belgrade under Srđan Grbić and in Munich under Bianca Bodalia. She completed her piano performance degree with distinction in Dresden with Winfried Apel. She has also attended master classes with Andrew Ball, Aldo Ciccolini, Michel Dalberto, Rudolf Kehrer and Amadeus Webersinke.
Mirjana Rajić has won prizes at various international piano competitions. Concert engagements have taken her to Germany, Italy, Spain, Serbia, France, Poland, Lithuania and Turkey as well as the United States, China, Japan and Singapore. She has appeared at international festivals such as the Dresden Music Festival, the Ruhr Piano Festival, the Moritzburg Festival and at festivals in France, Italy, Lithuania and Serbia.
In addition to her solo career, Mirjana Rajić is an avid chamber musician. Her chamber music partners are, among others, Pavel Berman, Saschko Gawriloff, David Geringas, Jan and Kai Vogler, Isang Enders, Mikhail Ovrutsky, Mikhail Simonyan and Quatuor Ébène as well as the Australian String Quartet. In addition to releasing several solo CDs, Mirjana Rajić has collaborated with Bayerischer Rundfunk, Deutschlandradio and Südwestrundfunk.
Mirjana Rajić has been a lecturer at the State High School for Music Carl Maria von Weber in Dresden since 2008 and since 2015 has been head of the piano section at the Dresdenʼs Carl Maria von Weber Secondary School for Music. She gives master classes in Germany, Serbia and France and is involved in the “Rhapsody in School” music outreach program for children and adolescents. Mirjana Rajić is in great demand as a juror for international competitions and is herself the initiator and artistic Director of the International Carl Maria von Weber Piano Competition in Dresden.
Ognjen Popović
was born in Pančevo, Serbia in 1977. In 1994 he initially studied at the State University of Music and the Performing Arts Stuttgart and pursued further studies starting in 1997 at the University of Music and Performing Arts Munich with Ulf Rodenhäuser. He has performed as a soloist with such leading ensembles as the Munich Philharmonic, the Chamber Orchestra of Europe, the Philharmonic of the Nations, the Belgrade Philharmonic, the Valencia Radio Orchestra and the Serbian RTS Symphony Orchestra. He has also worked as an orchestra member with Stuttgart’s State Opera, the Deutsche Kammerakademie Neuss, the Passau Symphony Orchestra and the Philharmonic of the Nations.
Ognjen Popović has won several prizes at international competitions including Jeunesses musicales in Belgrade and the Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy Conservatory Competition. He has been principal clarinet of the Belgrade Philharmonic Orchestra since 2002. In the same year he founded the Balkan Chamber Academy ensemble, which performs with well-known musicians from around the world. He is featured on several CD recordings, including with his Ognjen Popović Band as well as with the highly respected Villa Musica chamber music ensemble. He has also performed with that ensemble throughout Europe and been a guest lecturer at the Villa Musica Academy of Chamber Music in Germany.
Ognjen Popović is the initiator and artistic director of the Classic Fest Chamber Music Festival in his native city of Pančevo. He regularly gives clarinet master classes in Serbia, Spain, Montenegro, Germany, Croatia and Slovenia. He has been teaching clarinet at the Faculty of Music (FMU) in Belgrade since 2010, where he received his PhD in 2012.
Ognjen Popović’s own compositions for clarinet and piano, as well as various chamber music works, are published by Köbl in Munich.
