ANTON ŠPENKO, learning piano, organ, boni, percussion
ANTON ŠPENKO - LEARNING THE PIANO, ORGAN, DRUMS, PERCUSSION
Anton Špenko started learning the piano at the age of seven at the Kamnik music school with professor Aleš Studen. He completed 8 years of piano and then 4 years of organ with professor Aleš Studen. In the 2nd year of high school, in addition to piano and organ, he began to learn percussion with Professor Martin Janežič (Buco), a well-known Slovenian drummer of music groups such as: Hamo & Tribute 2 Love, Sausages, Siddharta... . At first, he was mainly interested in melodic percussion instruments: xylophone, marimba and, most of all, vibraphone with a strong note of jazz. In eight years of percussion, in addition to melodic percussion, he also reworked a large part of the percussion family, from batteries to timpani... . All this time, in addition to the organ and percussion, the piano was the closest thing to him, and his main mentor and professor Aleš Studen watched over his improvement of technique, who left a great impression on him, both musically and pedagogically. It was he who inspired him already in these years of music school with a wider spectrum of music, in addition to classical composers such as: Haydn, Mozart, Bach, Clementi, Czerny... even masters such as: Scarlatti, Grieg, Liszt, Beethoven, Chopin, Debussy, Ravel, Rachmaninoff, Korsakov, Gershwin, Clayderman and others. Uroš Pele is also one of his piano mentors. The piano is close to him precisely because of the diverse and extremely large, if not the largest, spectrum of music that playing the piano offers, not only classical music but also jazz, film music, rock and some more popular genres and arrangements. He is happy to play more complex arrangements and variations of compositions in which different styles are interwoven.
In addition to so-called classical music, he devotes a large part of his music to jazz and film music. He also likes to try and experiment in improvisation and composition. Among all this, however, he does not like to limit himself to the stylistic frameworks and divisions of music that are in force today. However, since he became increasingly interested in the jazz color of music and improvisation during his high school days, he learned a lot from his role model and mentor Gregor Ftičar (jazz piano, improvisation). He improved his skills at international workshops and camps, especially Jazz Camp Kranj with mentor David Gazarov (jazz piano, improvisation, harmony, chamber music) and others...
Along with enrolling to study architecture, he also passed the entrance exams at the Ljubljana Conservatory of Music and Ballet, first for organ (major B) and later also for piano (major C, jazz). During this period, he learned a lot from his organ mentor, Nina Frank, with a strong emphasis on the old masters: Bach, Vivaldi, Purcell... all the way to romanticism and modern authors...
Already in music school, he encountered chamber music and groups. First, in the percussion chamber of the common music school under the direction of professor Martin Janežič and duets or piano and violin accompaniments with his brother. He also played in various orchestras, starting with the youth brass band of the music school, and he also worked with a string orchestra. He performed during the period of activity of the brass band DKD solidarity and also as a soloist, also with the GTD orchestra,...
He started developing a large part of his music and chamber music in 2014 with his friends and brother. In 2015, they finally founded a chamber group called The Castlers "Castles" (Organ/piano, 3 violins, trumpet). Since then, the group has been rehearsing and performing with short performances, concerts, and staged masses in the Franciscan Church in Kamnik, where the group was founded. They have performed in other places as well. From the very beginning, they performed a wide range of music by the old masters, baroque with the most recognizable Vivaldi precisely because of the nature of the violins and the very scheme of a string quartet with a trumpet. Especially during the Christmas season, the scope of music expands greatly to include genres of music from around the world to jazz, rock and film music. They themselves like to cover various compositions by today's masters such as John Williams and Ennio Morricone. During all these years, they were joined by other friends with instruments such as flute, euphonium, cella... so in 2019, at the initiative of their friends, they founded a small chamber symphony orchestra called The Castlers Orchestra (violins, cello, flutes, oboe, clarinet, saxophones, trumpet, euphonium, piano, percussion) from the 15th-17th centuries. members of the orchestra, who performed a varied program throughout the year on major holidays in the Franciscan Church of Kamnik. The Castlers band is still actively working with ever new ideas, projects, concerts that the future brings...