STA, 14 June 2022 - President Borut Pahor bestowed on Tuesday state decorations on lyricist Elza Budau, choreographer and dancer Edward Clug and conductor Ervin Hartman.
Budau, a poet who penned the lyrics of over 1,000 popular Slovenian songs, including some of the most memorable ones from the golden period of Slovenian chanson, was honoured with the Silver Order of Merit.
"Her texts, together with the melodies of the greatest Slovenian composers of so-called easy going notes, created works of art that have survived for decades and and are today part of the treasury of the nation's collective memory," the president's office said.
Clug, the Romanian-born Slovenian dancer and choreographer, whose works have sold out the Bolshoi Theatre and London Coliseum, also received the Silver Order of Merit.
— Borut Pahor (@BorutPahor) June 14, 2022
Clug started making waves as the main name of the SNG Maribor Ballet company in the 1990s to be appointed the ensemble's artistic director in 2003.
Pahor's office said Clug, the recipient of a number of prestigious international awards, helped SNG Maribor Ballet conquer the world.
Hartman, who has conducted a number of wind orchestras in Slovenia and abroad, was conferred the Medal of Merit for his contribution to the development of wind orchestra music and music culture in Slovenia.
He is the author of the first Slovenian manual for leading a wind orchestra in motion and is credited with the first performances of many Slovenian composers. In 1990 he founded a music publishing house which has published more than 300 mainly novel Slovenian pieces for wind orchestras.
