Jerry Grcevich (; born 1951) is a Croatian-American folk musician, tamburitza virtuoso, and composer. He is a frontman of the Penn Sembles.
Biography Grcevic was born in Turtle Creek, Pennsylvania, to a family of Croatian emigrants from Ozalj, Karlovac, and Podravina.Jerry Grcevich virtuoz iz Pennsylvanije [Jerry Grcevich, virtuoso from Pennsylvania] Biography at the selo.hr. Access date September 11, 2021. He was introduced to the tamburitza by his father and uncle, both tamburica players (with the Sloboda Tamburitza Orchestra), and started playing in his father's orchestra at ten years old. At the age of 21, he traveled to Croatia (then, the Socialist Republic of Croatia) and Vojvodina, where he studied with Janika Balaž in Novi Sad. He also met Zvonko Bogdan, with whom he toured in the U.S. and Canada.Jerry Grcevich Masters of Traditional Arts. Access date September 11, 2021. Since 1980, he has composed and recorded his own music. As a player of multiple tamburica instruments (bisernica, brač, bugarija, berda, and čelo), he usually plays and records entire albums solo. During the 1980s, Grcevich took multiple ethnomusicological research trips throughout Croatia.
In the late 1980s, he started a collaboration with Miroslav Škoro, which produced his first album, Ne dirajte mi ravnicu. He is co-composer and arranger of Škoro's hits "Moja Juliška" and "Ne dirajte mi ravnicu".Mirjana Piskulić. Škorina Ravnica rođena je u dubokim rudnicima i vrućim čeličanama Pennsylvanije, među našom dijasporom Večernji list. Published June 20, 2019. Access date September 11, 2021. Since 1993, Grcevich has had his own group, the Jerry Grcevich Tamburitza Orchestra, which has performed extensively throughout the U.S. and Canada.
In 2005, he was awarded a National Heritage Fellowship by the National Endowment for the Arts for his musical work, especially for performances and cultural cooperation with Irish, Romanian, and Hungarian Americans in Pittsburgh. He also became the first Western-Pennsylvanian artist to receive the award.Bill O'Driscoll. A Conversation with Jerry Grcevich Pittsburgh City Paper. Published January 5, 2006. Access date September 11, 2021.
Discography New Traditions (Novi Odlazak Productions, 1992) Croatian Dances Vol.III (self-released, 1997) Mila Moja (self-released, 2008) Sonya i Jerry, Kao Nekad (self-released, 2011) Tamburitza Dance Tonight (self-released, 2013)
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