Farewell to honorary member Jože Banič

Jože Banič, bassoonist, tenor, teacher

*10 March 1945 + 21 February 2026

It is with great sadness that we announce that, in his 81st year, our fellow singer and friend, longtime member of the Slovenski oktet, the tenor Jože Banič, has completed his life’s journey.

We will keep him in fond memory.

Slovenski oktet

Excerpt from the book by B. Pangerc: Slovenski oktet, Ljubljana, 2007

Jože Banič was born in Murska Sobota on 10 March 1945. In the Slovenski oktet he sang second tenor, from 1979 to 1992 and from 1996 to 2000.
In Murska Sobota he completed the first year of grammar school while also attending a lower music school.
He studied violin for six years and clarinet for four. At the Secondary Music School in Ljubljana he was persuaded to take up the bassoon, which he studied for four years, and then for five years at the Academy of Music.
“In a way I was self-taught on the bassoon. In the first year my professor Korošak was doing his military service, in the second he was studying in Paris, in the third we fell out, and in the fourth I had already graduated … I gave my graduation recital in 1971 at the Society of Slovenian Composers (Jože Skok, KRIČAČ no. 1, January/February 2006).”
Jože Banič played in the RTV Slovenija Symphony Orchestra, from 1965 to 1997 he was a member of the RTV Wind Orchestra, for eight years he played in a Baroque ensemble in Maribor, for some time in the Slavko Osterc Ensemble, and in the RTV Chamber Orchestra, he is still a member of the Camerata Labacensis ensemble, and one could go on listing. In the Slovenski oktet he succeeded Božo Grošelj in 1978 and sang for seventeen years.
At present, purely for his own pleasure, he conducts the Hrastnik Wind Band.
“The first period,” in the Symphony Orchestra, that is, “is in my fondest memory. And not out of nostalgia. At that time we were all young, extremely keen and self-sacrificing, we wanted the highest-quality playing. Samo Hubad deserves special credit for this inspiration … “(In the orchestra) we worked together very well. We stuck together, which was especially noticeable in intonation and in making music together. An orchestra must function like a flawless military unit led by a good officer. Certain conditions are needed for this. If they are absent, goodwill, self-sacrifice and keenness have to be created. Closer friendships develop among the members of the ensemble, but also hatreds and jealousy. Some people even marry in the orchestra; in short, it is a living organism (ibid.).”
It was his brother Milan who introduced him to singing; in 1961 he took him along to a rehearsal of the Primorska Academic Choir Vinko Vodopivec in Ljubljana, and he spent an exceptionally fine youth in that choir; he was the youngest singer in the choir and his fellow singers treated him as a sort of mascot.
In 1972 he began studying solo singing with Prof. Jelka Strgar, to whom he gives great credit for having “set his voice”, meaning that she gave him firm technical foundations in solo singing, which later served him very well for singing in the octet.
In fact, Jože Banič became so enthusiastic that at a certain point, when he was already at the Academy of Music, he had to choose between a singing career and the bassoon.
“I often think that I may have made a mistake in not devoting myself fully to the study of solo singing and giving up the bassoon,” which sounds unusual, because it is said by a man who embodies the very idea of the bassoon in Slovenia and throughout the former Yugoslavia, and he adds: “In my soul I was always a bassoonist, but had singing prevailed, I would have given up the instrument. The fact is, though, that I feel joy and happiness in singing too.” At the same time Jože Banič also has an exceptionally keen attitude to the art of singing:
“The voice is a divine instrument, nothing can replace it. God gave us the voice, and with it feelings can be expressed best; in singing especially, because text and sound are contained in one.
What I enjoyed most in the octet was that on stage we made music in every performance. We always gave our all, both in expression and in sound, and the audience’s response at the concert was commensurate.
Singing aroused in me an inexpressible inner satisfaction, when soul and heart play and one approaches a kind of ecstatic state. Such moments may be longer or shorter, but they cannot be paid for with any amount of money.”
Jože Banič first encountered the Slovenski oktet in 1967. A celebration of the United Nations was held in Slovenj Gradec, in which the Slovenski oktet also took part: “When I heard them, I realised in an instant that this was supreme singing, and shivers ran through my whole body.”
Fate decreed that Banič himself would also become one of the protagonists of such feelings, when Božo Grošelj left the octet in 1978.
“Yes, filling the void left by Grošelj was exceptionally difficult. At that time the Slovenski oktet was at the top, and then half of the line-up changed. Anton Nanut then committed himself enormously to achieving the former excellence with the new line-up. We rehearsed as many as five times a week from 5.30 to 7.30 pm, and we all worked with great dedication.” The octet’s creativity was reflected most strongly in its concert programmes. “The octet was strongest in the variety of its programmes. It had singers of such quality that they could master all styles, and a conglomerate of styles could be performed perfectly. In this way every listener could find something for themselves, and all together could enjoy the quality of the performance of the pieces.”
His bassoon is also inseparably linked with the period in which Jože Banič sang with the Slovenski oktet.
The Slovenski oktet, Jože Banič and his bassoon together wrote a lasting and unrepeatable story.
For the octet’s 35th anniversary the composer Pavel Mihelčič created a special piece, “Kost”, into which he also wove the bassoon.
“The piece is extremely interesting both conceptually (in its design) and compositionally. As an innovation it had an exceptional resonance. For music critics and for listeners alike, a piece that contained supreme singing and the bassoon as a solo interlude was a real discovery. We performed it 132 times. It was warmly received all over the world. In the United States of America I received many congratulations from bassoonists.”
Jože Banič and his bassoon represented a special symbiosis in the Slovenski oktet.
“I did not only sing in the octet, I also played in the radio orchestra and appeared as a soloist at home and around the world. On tours with the octet I always took my bassoon with me and practised regularly and persistently so that I could rejoin the orchestra in decent form when we got back. It was demanding, sometimes tense, but never a crisis.”
Through his devotion to music, Jože Banič managed to overcome obstacles and pitfalls. What is more, in 1996, when Nanut began gathering singers for the new octet, he conscientiously came to help and, with his experience and the vocal capital he carried within him, contributed significantly to the Slovenski oktet putting down new roots.
“It is good that the Slovenski oktet continues this tradition, because it is and remains something special. The Slovenski oktet has always been a target of criticism, resentment, envy … we know how it is with Slovenes. But the Slovenski oktet has always been the best and will be the best.

I think the Slovenski oktet is now at a crossroads, and I see two options for the future: either it secures institutional support, to be freed of all financial worries and pursue its excellence in peace, or it manages to establish itself well in marketing terms and obtains suitable support from the Slovenian business community.
What remains indisputable and unique is that – wherever it sings, people will be struck dumb by the beauty of the sound!”

(Ljubljana, 23 June 2006)