Jerry Grcevich
Photograph by Alan Govenar
Bio
Jerry Grcevich, born in Turtle Creek, Pennsylvania, near Pittsburgh, studied tamburitza (Croatian string music) with his father and uncle, both musical directors and performers. At the age of 21, Grcevich made a pilgrimage to Yugoslavia to study with the famous tamburitza prim player, Janika Balaz, the first of many musical journeys to the homeland of tamburitza. In 1980, he began composing and recording his own musical pieces. Because he mastered all five of the instruments of the tamburitza ensemble – the prim, brac, tamburitza cello, bugarija, and tamburitza bass – he often uses "sound-on-sound" recording techniques, to construct an ensemble featuring only his own playing. As a result of his special musical skills, he is able to capture the characteristic melody, harmony, counterpoint, and rhythm of the tamburitza orchestra.
In addition to leading a live ensemble, the Jerry Grcevich Orchestra, he has recorded and toured with most of the well-known tamburitza musicians alive today. He is generally recognized as the premiere prim player in the world. At a performance in Slovenska-Pozega, Croatia, in 1994, he realized that many of the tamburitza groups were playing songs that he had composed, a testament to his influence in the homeland. In 2001, he was inducted into the Tamburitza Hall of Fame, the youngest musician to receive that honor.
Interview with Mary Eckstein
NEA: I wanted to first congratulate you on receiving the award. How did you feel when you heard the news?
MR. GRCEVICH: I was quite surprised. I really was. I was so surprised that I asked twice, "Would you please repeat that?"
NEA: Tell me about your earliest experiences learning the music and practicing the tradition?
MR. GRCEVICH: When I was four years old. I took my dad's brac to the top of the steps and tried to see if it would slide all the way to the bottom without breaking. He wasn't around, of course. My mother found me and said I wasn't allowed to do that again!
Shortly after that, I started picking it up and playing. Not tunes but just plinking around, listening. My father and uncle had an orchestra that rehearsed at our house, which I would listen to. And my father took me to hear them play at picnics, family gatherings, and so on.
NEA: What did you think of the music at that age?
MR. GRCEVICH: I didn't separate it from other music that was being played around me. I didn't separate American music from Croatian music. It was all music to me. And I had my favorite records - kids songs and things like that - that I would put on. And I would put on my dad's records, too.
NEA: Did you learn the instruments quickly, given your early start?
MR. GRCEVICH: No, it was gradual. My dad taught me a little bit until he got frustrated with me, then my uncle taught me. My grandfathers played, too, both of them and taught me some. They brought the instruments over from Croatia.
NEA: Tell me about the role this music plays in the community in the Croatian-American community here?
MR. GRCEVICH: When I was gowing up we would go to Croatian dances and make new friends, friends that remained friends for a lifetime. A lot of men meet their fiancees through Croatian churches and social functions, and at the tamburitza festivals. Of course, the music was a big part of all of that.
Keeping the tradition alive is a part of our life, too. Traditions have a tendency to die faster in the country where the where they are from. We have a natural tendency outside the country to want to preserve our culture because we're away from it. It was something that we held on to dearly because it came from our parents and grandparents.
NEA: Have you seen a lot of changes in the music and the tradition?
MR. GRCEVICH: I realize now some of the changes in the music were already happening when my grandfather came to this country and taught the music to his sons - my father and my uncle. The music got a bit Americanized, which was good in a way because my father and people like my father could play the taverns, bars, and hotels here in the Pittsburgh area. They were accepted by everyone who came to listen because they could play Croatian and traditional music from Eastern Europe, and also play whatever was popular on American radio stations.
NEA: What are the challenges of playing and sustaining this music?
MR. GRCEVICH: Any time we go out to play it's a challenge. I always get excited about the event no matter if it's a birthday party down the street, a three day festival somewhere, or a huge concert. It's always a thrill. It's always a challenge because no matter whether there are 25 or 2,500 people, you want to touch them in some way. You want to satisfy them and make them feel good. And I'm a little bit of a – well, I want to show off what I can do! But mostly we want people to like our music.
NEA: You do a lot of composing. Tell me about your process.
MR. GRCEVICH: Sometimes a nice melody will come into my head and then I'll seek lyrics for it. At other times someone will give me lyrics and ask me to compose the melody.
When things are happening, I get on a roll. Sometimes I'll get lyrics that I really like and I'll compose a melody in two or three minutes. The ideas really flow. I've done that quite a few times. It's like receiving a gift because I don't know where it comes from. But other times it's a struggle and I'll compose something that sounds too much like someone else or even like something I had composed before. When that happens, or if I'm just not getting anything, I'll give it a break, do something else, then come back and start fresh.
NEA: How do creating something new with while keeping it within the traditional aesthetic?
MR. GRCEVICH: That's something that I take pride in - knowing the boundaries. I think I'm very good at that. I'm very respectful of those boundaries.
NEA: You've just returned from Croatia. What's going on there with this music?
MR. GRCEVICH: Croatia is very diversified as far as music goes and a lot of changes have occurred there also. Tamburitza music at one time was widespread and was taught in every school. Now it's just being taught in some schools.
One thing I love to do when I'm over there is go into the schools and see what's going on. One year I researched and collected tamburitza sheet music, filled a suitcase with it, and took it over there and donated it to the schools. I found some really good arrangements - old Croatian music, music from movies and plays and shows, semi-classical music, and music from different cultures. It was a wonderful feeling to be able to give something to the schools over there, for the real young kids over there who will be learning.
NEA: One final question. What has inspired you to continue playing tamburitza music through the years?
MR. GRCEVICH: The people that I've played for and the people I play with. It seems like that there's quite a few of us that play and we have our own kind of connection. We reassure each other when we're not sure we should go on doing this. But we keep playing because we love the music and we want people to love it, too.