In 2011 I quit my PhD studies and a full-time job as an engineer; thus ending my professional career as a physicist. I followed my intuition and dedicated my focus to sound and music. Since 2000, I had been developing my skills while working as a sound engineer at Radio Študent, (one of the oldest independent radio stations in Europe founded as a result of student protests in 1968 in Ljubljana) where I had also expanded my musical horizons as a member of the music redaction department.

In the search for my personal path after leaving my job, I came across the sound engineer (Tonmeister) study program at the Royal Danish Academy of Music (RDAM) in Copenhagen. After passing the entrance exams, I set off for Denmark, determined to finally dedicate myself to classical music. One year into my studies, after a series of chance circumstances, I decided to take a trip to the Peruvian Amazon Rainforest, the home of many indigenous peoples. When I heard their singing I made a firm promise to myself that I would never travel again without field recording equipment. During my next trip I made my first recordings of folk music and traditional liturgy in Ukraine. That experience fueled my growing desire to spend my third year of studies in China, where I wished to discover its traditional music, above all the tradition of its minorities and tribes.

I had been attracted to China ever since I had gotten over a serious illness with the help of an energetic healing method that had originated there. After several years of training in this method, I combined the desire to record music with the desire to research energies, especially how music connects us to our spirituality. After two years of preparations, I finally succeeded – I spent an entire school year at the Shanghai Conservatory of Music. While there I embarked on my first real expedition, a two-month journey through the southwestern Chinese province of Yunnan. I recorded everything that came across my way. From those recordings I put together an hour-long musical journey in the form of a CD titled The Other Side of China.

After receiving my Bachelor’s degree I have worked full time for two years as a sound engineer in the Production Unit for documentary program of RTV Slovenia, the Slovenian national television. During this time I started my masters studies at RDAM and went to Shanghai again for a full study year to do further field work, this time besides recording in the Chinese provinces of Sichuan and Guangxi, I also traversed The Philippines. To carry out this plan I had to resign again from the job at the TV station.

After receiving my masters degree as a Tonmeister in 2018, I was freelancing in Slovenia while dedicating more and more time to ethnographic studies and presenting my work at the ICTM  and SIEF conferences. In september 2019 I started a PhD studies in ethnomusicology at the NOVA University in Lisbon.

Sound Engineer