FOLKLORNA GRUPA MLADI HRVATI — Na mladima svijet ostaje!
Last Man Standing Raffle
First Prize: $10k Travel Voucher
Second Prize: $2000 The Good Guys Gift Card
Third Prize: $500 Cash
For more info, please contact Elena on 0413 337 710
To be drawn on 24 June, 2023 at F.G. Mladi Hrvati's 45th Anniversary Zabava
Read moreAs we draw closer to what we hope will be the end of our second lockdown here in Melbourne, we can’t help but reflect on the year that has been.
Read moreFor the first time ever Folklorna Grupa Mladi Hrvati will be hosting a Maškare Party in the newly renovated hall at the Croatian Catholic Centre in Clifton Hill on 22 February, 2020.
The Maškare Party is set to dazzle guests with free Croatian cocktails on arrival - or CROcktails - and food by the wonderful Your Private Chef, who most recently catered for the knock-out Marin Cilic Foundation dinner at the Croatian Catholic Centre in Sunshine.
Maškare or Carnival has been a centuries-old tradition in cities and towns all over Croatia. Each year, the Maškare celebration takes place just before Ash Wednesday and is a time for people to enjoy and indulge in foods that are traditionally forbidden during the 40 days of Lent (e.g animal fats, eggs & meat). Anyone for pancakes?!
According to ancient folklore, ferocious masks were worn as a way to ward off evil spirits. In towns like Dubrovnik, maškare dates back to the 14th century. Since at that time masks were banned, people wore national costume instead.
Not only is the upcoming Maškare Party a celebration, proceeds from ticket sales will go towards expanding Mladi Hrvati’s range of nošnje (costumes). To build upon our existing repertoire of dances, we are looking at investing in nošnje from other regions of Croatia. The Mladi Hrvati 'garderoba' is currently home to nošnje from Slavonija, Zagrebačko Prigorje, Vrlika, Posavina, Zadar, Split, Dolina Neretva, Međimurje and Baranje.
Over the years we have been blessed to have some nošnje donated and some purchased by Mladi Hrvsti. Back in the 70s and 80s, we were lucky to have nošnje made by the dedicated and talented hands of local Croatian seamstresses who would spend hours sewing at home. These nošnje are remarkably still worn by our group today. That's three generations! This is what we do at Mladi Hrvati and as Croatians, we pass stories and traditions down our generation and that's what keeps our culture strong.
The making of an authentic nošnja nowadays is a true art form that few are able to master like the Tete and Bake of years ago. Each nošnja takes time and patience and most nošnje are made up of at least five different pieces. For women, it is the 'podsuknja' (underskirt or petticoat), the suknja (skirt), the pregaća (apron), the blouse, the marama (wrap) and then various types of 'nakit' or accessories. It is no wonder that each nošnja set is worth hundreds of dollars!
Like precious cultural treasures, our new nošnje will be cherished and passed on for the next three generations to enjoy.
Tickets to the Maškare CROcktail Party can be purchased from the Mladi Hrvati online shop here or contact Kata on 0433 205 423 for more details.
Members from our Intermediate group were interviewed for SBS Croatian Radio following Folklorna Grupa Mladi Hrvati’s annual Christmas Play at Sv. Nikola Tavelic Church in Clifton Hill on 22 December, 2019.
The Intermediates were asked questions like what it meant to them to dance Croatian folklore and how they faired learning Croatian songs. Still on a high after their outstanding performance for the annual Christmas nativity play, the Intermediates treated parishioners to an impromptu vocal performance on the steps in the church's courtyard.
The full interview can be listened to here.
What an amazing weekend. An exciting and long overdue milestone achieved for our community.
When our committee formed in 2015, we gave ourselves many goals to work towards so that we could bring our group up to where we wanted it to be. One of these long-term goals was to take our group on a performing tour of Croatia, and the other was to renovate our dilapidated church hall. How extremely proud and thankful we are that both of these long-term goals are being carried out a mere four years later!
As many other Croatian community groups and organisations would know, it’s not always an easy task to keep our legacy going, but we keep on keeping on. “There will be obstacles. There will be doubters. There will be mistakes. But with hard work, there are no limits.”
Our committee wishes to extend a heartfelt thank you to all of our Mladi Hrvati members for their continued support and loyalty; to our broader Croatian community here in Victoria for their support and encouragement; and to our immediate families for their unwavering support and patience in allowing us to work the hours that we do so that we are able to achieve our goals.
With that being said, we still have many more goals to get to, so stand-by as we begin to tick them off our list.
God Bless!
Mladi Hrvati Committee
Both of us have grown up with Croatian folklore playing a huge part in our lives. As time passed, life and other adventures took over, marriage and children took a priority, and folklore was put on hold, but the love and appreciation for our culture and arts always remained.
Once you have experienced Croatian folkloric dancing, it never quite leaves you. We found ourselves back in the folklore community as mothers of young children after Sandra was contacted by Mladi Hrvati founder, Mrs Gizela Kechenovich to help her re-establish the group after it had broken down several years earlier. Mrs Kechenovich was determined to see the group restored to its former glory when her and husband, Aleks were teaching.
We wear several different hats within our group, as many of our other committee members do. In addition to our committee responsibilities, we make up part of the teaching and choreography team here at Mladi Hrvati. We took this responsibility on with full gusto, with a new direction and ideas ready to go.
One of the most important things to us as teachers and choreographers is to make sure that we are continually challenging and stimulating our members, as well as our audiences. When we create our choreographies, we look at it from both a dancer and audience perspective, making sure that it is both aurally and visually interesting and dynamic, whilst at the same time, making sure that we are paying respect to the style, music and footwork of each region. This process is challenging, exciting and rewarding, and we have established some great relationships when seeking out advice from other groups, choreographers and composers along the way.
Over the last five years, we have introduced four new regions of dance to the group, which includes new music, choreographies and new complete nosnja sets. The nosnje, oh my! That is another blog post in itself - shout out to our nosnja team! We often ask ourselves if we are crazy to be taking on so much new repertoire in such a short space of time, but we believe this is the only way forward for our group. Our members love to learn, and they love to be challenged, and Croatia’s folkloric culture is so diverse, we have only just scratched the surface! How can we not continue to bring new dances and music to our community here in Australia? It’s especially nice to see that look of excitement on an audience member’s face when they realise that the group will be performing songs and dances from their region that they may not have seen before.
It can be challenging as teachers to have your own children as part of a group that you are teaching, because you need to completely remove your ‘mother’ hat and have them look at and listen to you strictly as their teacher; but these kids are our greatest motivator in doing all of this. Through their connection to folklore, they have found their place within our Croatian community, and they feel a sense of belonging. We are fortunate enough to be able to witness the beginnings of some long lasting friendships, and we can only hope that these children too learn to love and appreciate their culture and community enough to keep our traditions going for the generation to follow. After all, na mladima svijet ostaje!
Welcome to 2018, our 40th year! We are so proud to have reached this incredible milestone in representing Croatian folkloric traditions in Melbourne, Australia!
It is our proud duty and responsibility to work hard at these traditions and maintaining these time honoured dances and songs for future generations.
As we head into this year of celebrations, those of us who have shared our younger years at Mladi Hrvati begin to reminisce about our youth and how it was back in the day. The memorable performances, the trips and events, the friends we made and our dear teachers Gospodin Aleksa and Gospođa Gizela Kechenovich who we remember, and they must remember so much more!
This year we extend a warm and heartfelt invitaton to all past members to join us for our 40th Anniversary Gala Night which will be held on June 16th at the Croatian Centre in Sunshine. This reunion Gala will be an opportunity to catch up with old friends and to recollect special memories of their time with Folklorna Grupa Mladi Hrvati. I believe there's also an opportunity or two to brush up on your kolo moves! We've got some special guests joining us and it will be a wonderful folklor family get together!
I look forward the the year ahead because if you think this year is going to be big for Mladi Hrvati, wait until you hear about next year!
Let's get this party started.... Iiiijuuuujuu!
While technology has connected Croatia’s diaspora in a way that has never been experienced before, it is the cultural links that will help younger generations understand their ancestry and embrace their traditions and customs.
Read moreHere we are again ready for a brand new year! I would like to sincerely thank our 2016 committee!
We say goodbye to our beloved Nataly, and send out a huge thankyou for all of her support. Nataly has been a wealth of knowledge and experience while on our committee and we wish her all the best! We now say hello and a very warm welcome to our newest committee member, Elena. We know that you will rock as Fundraising Coordinator this year!
The committee and I are already running at full steam!
Our Adult group will be heading down to Dalmatia as we begin work on brand new songs and dances from the Dolina Neretve region. The adults will be focused on this region and brand new nosnje from Croatia will be heading our way shortly. These are exciting new developments for Mladi Hrvati and we are looking forward to adding these beautiful songs and dances to our growing folkloric repertoire.
Our Intermediate group of pre-teens is working hard, learning songs and dances from the Zagrebacko Prigorje region which is challenging their skills, but they are loving every minute of it! These dances are lively and keep them on their toes, while improving their dance skills from week to week.
The Junior group is growing all the time, and not just in height! Our youngest members who are getting to the ripe old age of 6 or 7 have welcomed some of their younger siblings who have reached the age where they can join in the fun. They no longer have to sit on the sidelines and watch, but are now taking part in this super cute little group’s dance practice and learning new songs and dances from okolice Zadra.
It is wonderful to see this amazing group of children, parents and adults being part of one of the first Croatian folkloric groups in Melbourne. This group’s history is long and proud and as we gear up for a very special year next year, it is wonderful to see current adult members who once danced as children, share their love of Croatian folkloric song and dance with their own children. Two folkloric generations, dancing as one.
Next year we will be celebrating 40 years of Folklorna Grupa Mladi Hrvati, a time of reflection and catching up with old members. Planning and preparations for our 40th anniversary celebrations are already underway, and we look forward to celebrating with all members, past and present! To all those who helped fire up Croatian folkloric dance at Clifton Hill, we thank you and as we have always said and will continue to say for many years to come... Na Mladima Svijet Ostaje!
Suzy Horvat - President - Folklorna Grupa Mladi Hrvati – Clifton Hill
Na mladima svijet ostaje.. this has been stuck in my brain ever since I came to Mladi Hrvati..
My journey with Croatian folkloric dancing first began when I was seven years old, with the dance group ‘Ljerica-Footscray’ back in 1988. When this group disbanded I moved around to other dance groups within Melbourne until I finally found my home with Folklorna Grupa Mladi Hrvati in Clifton Hill.
I was taught by Mladi Hrvati founders, Mr Alex and Mrs Gizela Kechenovich, and progressed through the ranks of the Junior Group, the Intermediate Group and then finally to the Big Group, as it was then named. I began to assist Mr and Mrs Kechenovich in teaching the Junior Group for a period of time. Not long after this, they announced their plans to retire from dancing after 20 years of dedicated work and in 1998, I took over as primary dance teacher for all three groups.
During this time, I was fortunate enough to attend two seasons of professional Croatian dance instruction in Croatia under the guidance of Dr. Ivan Ivancan, and his professional counterparts under the umbrella of ‘Hrvatska Matica Iseljenika’ (Croatian Heritage Foundation) and bring some of these dance styles and steps back to Australia.
Croatian folklore to me is being able to pass on our heritage, custom and culture and language to other members of the Australian community in a way that is unique and not set in a classroom environment, rather a fun and rewarding one. My reward is seeing the enjoyment and satisfaction from the students and parents after performances and this is all I need to validate why we choose to keep the tradition of folklore going.
What also inspires me is the people that go to extraordinary efforts behind the scenes to make things happen for our group. This is especially apparent when you see the group prospering like never before. That is why there is such a strong sense of family within the Mladi Hrvati community – we know that we can all count on one another.
I have also taken up tamburica playing and am a part of the Mladi Hrvati Tamburica Orchestra. It comes as a nice change to be sitting in the ‘student’ chair again.
My aim for all of this is to ensure the safe, secure and correct passage of our heritage to future generations of Australian-Croatians through folklore.
Na mladima svijet ostaje!
Article written by Maya Juka and Sandra Juka, published by CroExpress.
'If you are a Croatian in Melbourne, then you have no doubt had some sort of affiliation with the Sveti Nikola Tavelic parish in Clifton Hill'.
Croatian version: http://croexpress.eu/vijest.php?vijest=8947
Article written by Suzy Horvat, published by Hrvatski Vjesnik (Croatian Herald).
Photos from F.G Mladi Hrvati archives.
Folklorna Grupa Mladi Hrvati were honoured to once again perform a snippet of 'Ero s Onoga Svijeta' on stage with Croatian rocker, Marko Perkovic 'Thompson', during his hit song 'Geni Kameni'.
Article written by Suzy Horvat and translated by Suzana Fantov. Published by Hrvatski Vjesnik (Croatian Herald), photos from F.G Mladi Hrvati archives.
For further footage and photos click on the links below:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CCsqmjuxZgo
http://croexpress.eu/vijest.php?vijest=7750
Article written by Suzy Horvat, translated by Suzana Fantov.
Published by Hrvatski Vjesnik (Croatian Herald).
Photos from F.G Mladi Hrvati archives.
A message from Jessica - a performer in the Intermediate group.
I first started with Mladi Hrvati when I was seven years old and have been dancing for seven years now. I love being a part of Mladi Hrvati because I like to learn about my Croatian culture and I love to learn new dances. I have made some great friends in my group and I love seeing them at dance practice each week. It's a great way to catch up with other friends who are the same age as me and share the same cultural background.
My teacher Antun Rehlicki is also my Godfather. Antun is always there to figure out any problems that we have and is always helping us improve our footwork so that we can get our dance moves to be smooth and spot on. And ... when we are not listening Antun makes sure we stay focused. I'm extra lucky to have him in my life as my god-father as well as my dance teacher!
My favourite dance that I have learnt so far is 'Srdim se, Dušo' which is part of the new Bunjevačko choreography that we are learning. I like this dance because I think it's interesting to learn how girls used to dance with their male dance partners in old times, and it's also a really pretty dance!
One of my most special memories is from the Annual Croatian Cultural festival, at the Hrvatski Dom in February this year. It was really great to perform in front of such a large crowd that included my family and friends. Before a performance I usually feel really nervous just as we are about to get on stage, but when I'm up there I feel great and I know that I'll be okay because I have my friends next to me and my family in the audience supporting me. When the music starts I feel even more at ease because I know the dance and we all just have a good time together. We do a big group cheer when we're back in the room changing back into our regular clothes because we know that even if we got a step wrong here or there, we did a great job and we did it together as a team.
I'm looking forward to moving into the Adult group one day because I will get to learn new dances and I'll be able to learn from all the experienced members who have been dancing for years.
Jessica, aged 14
"These igre are a great way for our kids to learn more about their language and culture, and they have fun while they are learning them!"
Click on the link below:
Article written by Suzy Horvat, translated by Suzana Fantov.
Published by Hrvatski Vjesnik (Croatian Herald).
Photos courtesy of Suzana Fantov and F.G Mladi Hrvati archives.
Article published by Hrvatski Vjesnik (Croatian Herald).
Photos courtesy of Suzana Fantov.
Article written by Suzy Horvat, published by Hrvatski Vjesnik (Croatian Herald).
Photos courtesy of Igor Milic.
