biography

Matija Kranjčić was born on the 17th of July 2002 in Zagreb, Croatia. He performed three times as a soloist with the Opatija Chamber Orchestra, in the Golden Ballroom in Opatija and in Culture House in Nova Gradiška. He was a semi-finalist at 19th Ettlingen International Piano Competition (Germany). Among the recent awards, he is happy to single out the first prize at the Globe International Piano Competition in Hilversum (2024), the Netherlands, and the first prize at the Jurica Murai Memorial International Competition in Varaždin (2022, Alink – Argerich Foundation). He is the winner of the rector’s award at the Music Academy Zagreb (2022) and Oscar of knowledge – Recognition of exellence (2023). In 2023, he won first prize at 20th Davorin Jenko International Piano Competition (Belgrade) in piano duo category.

At the age of eight, Matija started to learn playing the piano at the Elementary Music School “Rudolf Matz” in Zagreb, with Prof. Ela Korbar. In 2020, he graduated in piano in the class of Prof. Korbar and in music theory in the class of Prof. Katarina Višaticki. Currently, he attends Music Academy in Zagreb in the class of Đorđe Stanetti and Kunstuniversität in Graz in the class of professor Zuzana Niederdorfer. Since 2018, he has been working continuously with Professor Marietta Petkova in the Netherlands. Up to now, Matija has performed in Croatia (Sesvete, Varaždin, Čakovec, Dubrovnik, Samobor, Zagreb, Osijek, Split, Opatija, Marija Bistrica, Rijeka, Vela Luka, Križevci, Sinj, Novska, Jastrebarsko, Nova Gradiška) and abroad (Italy – Trieste, Slovenia – Ljubljana, Velenje, Radlje ob Dravi, Czech Republic – Usti nad Labem, The Netherlands – Emmen, Amsterdam, Almere, Apeldoorn, Winssen, Muiden, Houten, Ittervoort, Hilversum, Serbia – Beograd, Germany – Ettlingen, Austria – Graz, Bosnia and Herzegovina – Čapljina). Matija had the pleasure and privilege of attending piano masterclasses with the following acclaimed pianists and pedagogues: Stephen Kovacevich (USA), Daniel Blumenthal (Germany), Matti Raekallio (Finland), Konstantin Bogino (Russia), Manana Kandelaki (Russia), Nina Patarčec (France), Jitka Fowler Frankova (Czech Republic), Nataša Veljković (Austria), Milana Chernyavska (Ukraine), Julia Gubaidulina (Croatia), Danijel Detoni (Croatia), Srđan Čaldarović (Croatia), Ruben Dalibaltayan (Croatia)

Since 2012, Matija won many first, second, and third prizes at regional, national and international competitions. He is especially proud of great success in chamber music as in solo playing. Matija has performed in Duo von Meck with Laura and won 1st prize on National Chamber music Competition – 2018 and 2nd prize in 2019 (Zagreb and Opatija). Also, he has performed in duo with Jan Niković, Bože Cigić and trio with Jan and Goran Atalić.