Ansambel Jožeta Krežeta

Ansambel Jožeta Krežeta was a Slovenian narodnozabavna (folk-pop) ensemble, officially active from 1961. For many years it was a favourite of listeners, won many awards at the Ptuj festival and at Vesela jesen in Maribor, and was recognised by its leader, the blind accordionist Jože Kreže.

Kreže lost his sight in 1949, when a grenade exploded, but it did not stop him from writing his own tunes for the accordion. He recorded the first six of them as early as 1956 with a quartet of accordion, clarinet, guitar and drums; they were played only on Radio Koper and the tapes have not survived. In 1961 he formally founded the ensemble and registered it with the Association of the Blind, and as his first players had no experience of radio recording, he looked for new members. In 1963 the group recorded for Radio Ljubljana for the first time: twelve of its own tunes, under the name Orkester Jožeta Krežeta, with six musicians, a trombone and a vocal duet.

Through all those years Kreže played the accordion. On the records the line-up was Franc Lah on clarinet, Franc Logar on guitar and Ervin Hartman on drums, with Jože Potrč and later Jože Kristl on bass, and several trumpeters. The singing duet changed a few times; from 1968 to 1980 it was Helena Vergles and Rudi Trojner.

The ensemble won eleven awards at the Ptuj festival and thirteen at Vesela jesen. Jože Kreže wrote about 300 tunes and most of their lyrics himself, with some lyrics by Ivan Malavašič. The band released 18 LPs and 10 EPs, 15 of them on Jugoton and two in Austria, among them Kako si lepa, dežela naša (1967), Zabučale gore (1970), Iz srca za srce (1972), Drugi časi (1974) and Res je čuden ta naš svet (1977), and made ten television programmes of its own for TV Ljubljana. Its best-known songs are "Flosarji", "Mi smo mi", "Na ptujskem sejmu", "Pepek in Micika", "Stoj še dolgo, Ptuj ponosni" and "Ta vražji telefon".