Biography
Đuro Pete works between Serbia and Croatia. He completed elementary and secondary music education in Osijek with Vjekoslav Burić, then studied at the Academy of Arts in Novi Sad from 1980 to 1984 in the studio of Mihajlo Kelbli, returning there for master’s studies from 2006 to 2009 with Nikola Srdić. He has taken master classes with Michel Arrignon (Paris), Béla Kovács, Wenzel Fuchs, Jože Kotar and Mate Bekavac (Slovenia), and Zsolt Szatmári (Budapest).
As a student he won second prize at the Young Performing Artists of Yugoslavia competition in Zagreb (1983), first prize at the Vojvodina students’ competition in Novi Sad (1981), first prize at the state competition of former Yugoslavia in Sarajevo (1981) and first prize at the youth festival in Knjaževac. Alongside solo recitals he has appeared with the Pécs Youth Philharmonic, the Vojvodina Youth Philharmonic and the chamber orchestra of the Academy of Arts, and played clarinet in the orchestra of the Croatian National Theatre in Osijek.
He taught at the Josip Slavenski music school in Novi Sad and has been on the faculty of the Isidor Bajić Music School since 1987. His students have collected several dozen first prizes at national and international competitions, work recognised in 2010 with the annual prize of the Union of Music and Ballet Schools of Serbia. He has presided over the jury of the state competition of Serbia and judged in Požarevac, at “Davorin Jenko” in Belgrade and at the May Woodwind Meeting Point in Lazarevac, while organising young-clarinettist concerts across Vojvodina — from Subotica and Zrenjanin to Sombor and Novi Sad — to bring the instrument to new audiences.