Miljan Bjeletić joins the jury

Miljan Bjeletić — concert accordionist, international jury regular and, for more than two decades, one of the most influential accordion pedagogues in Serbia — joins the panel that judges this year's performances at the World Grand Prix.

His own artistry was forged in Kyiv. Bjeletić completed his studies at the P. I. Tchaikovsky Music Conservatory in the class of Prof. Dr N. A. Davidov, taking his Master's degree in 1998. Even as a student he was competing at the highest level, returning from the 1995 World Cup in Sweden with a bronze medal as the representative of FR Yugoslavia, and winning the Grand Prix at an international competition in France in 1997.

It is as a teacher, though, that his influence is most widely felt. Students from his class have collected more than two hundred prizes at home and abroad, and have carried the instrument onto concert platforms across Europe, Russia, China and beyond — laureates of the World Cup, the World Trophy and the great festivals of Pula, Castelfidardo and Klingenthal. Few have done more for the standing of the accordion in Serbia.

That work has not gone unrecognised: honours from the Association of Music and Ballet Pedagogues of Serbia and from the country's music and ballet schools, a certificate from the Higher League of the World's Accordionists in Kyiv, and the title of Associate Professor for his principal subject — the accordion.

He scores like every other juror, and under the same rule: anonymously, on the music alone. The jury sees an entry code, a category and a programme — never a name. The full jury line-up will be announced in the weeks ahead.