Carmen Stepić

Carmen Stepić graduated with a degree in piano from the Academy of Music at the University of Zagreb in the class of Professor Ljubomir Gašparović. She pursued advanced studies at the Richard Strauss Conservatory in Munich under Professor Robert Rogosz. After completing her studies, she began her career in music pedagogy across several music schools. Since 2000, she has been a faculty member at the Ferdo Livadić Music School in Samobor. Alongside the piano, she holds a special interest in chamber music and singing. Drawn to the beauty of Romance languages, she performs vocal repertoire in Portuguese, Spanish, Italian, Cape Verdean Creole, and Sephardic Ladino.

In 2002, Carmen founded the ensemble As bruxas fatais in collaboration with accordionist Gordana Šustić and guitarist Ivana Trogrlić Mandić. For several years, they performed in Croatia and abroad, presenting a repertoire that spanned various musical genres: from bossa nova, afrosamba, and tango to ballads and chansons. Among her other artistic collaborations, her work with pianist Željko Vlahović stands out, with whom she performed as Duo Anderletto. Their most significant project involved arrangements of ancient Sephardic songs, culminating in a themed concert at the Youngmasters Festival in Samobor in 2015.

As a piano pedagogue, Carmen Stepić has been active for over 30 years. Throughout her professional career, she has refined her skills under numerous eminent piano educators, most notably Olga Cinkoburova and Milana Chernyavska. She channels her creative insights and ideas through the UDSU (Art Association of Contemporary Teachers), of which she is a co-founder. The association’s mission is to promote new teaching tools and bring educators together on a collaborative platform that provided crucial professional support, particularly during the pandemic lockdowns.

Within the UDSU association, Professor Stepić launched the Nota Croata project, which focuses on current events in the Croatian music scene, highlighting forgotten or newly discovered literature as well as other events related to the pedagogical and artistic world. She has conducted interviews with distinguished musicians, most notably a conversation with Professor Vladimir Krpan—a maestro who personally described this interview as his most pleasant and liberating experience.

Together with her class, she is a constant presence at major concerts representing her school in the Samobor area and beyond. Driven by a desire for thematic breakthroughs, she creates numerous projects to bring specific stylistic periods closer to audiences through collaborations with other instruments. Her original projects include Advent in the Baroque, Haydniada, Women Composers, and Baroque as a Guest on Harpsichord and Organ.

Her students have won numerous accolades at international competitions, with notable achievements including first prizes at the “Jurica Murai” International Competition won by her students Fabijan Košćak and Volodymyr Shynkarov, as well as a special prize for a classical period piece in Radlje ob Dravi.

She prepared Haydn’s Piano Concerto in D major for piano and orchestra with Fabijan Košćak for the Samobor Autumn Music Festival. In collaboration with Zorica Mihaljević, she also prepared Bach’s Double Concerto in C minor, which her then-student Fabijan Košćak performed alongside Ivan Rod and the Zagreb Soloists, organized by the Croatian Musical Youth (HGM).

Professor Stepić considers her former students to be her greatest achievement—five of them are now her colleagues, working alongside her at the Ferdo Livadić Music School.

In her musical and pedagogical work, Carmen Stepić encourages young individuals to find their own life path, wherein music may or may not be their primary profession. She views music as a necessity, calling the discovery of its secrets “a sanctuary for our souls.”