Recital / Split / 19 May 1998
Characteristics of great performers are always inspiring and impressive, but when they are expressed in a 14-year-old cellist, we witness a supernatural reality. Karmen Pečar possesses an incredible musical maturity and embraces intellectual and artistic qualities that we cannot explain. She simply could not have learned the things she knows. This young artist was born with a cello and was given an incredible inheritance that others must simply learn.
Tatjana Alajbeg
Violin music played on a cello / 5 May 1999
The works were performed perfectly. This young cellist showed an extraordinary dedication and depth in every bar. The meaningful performance was enhanced with an excellent command of the bow and vibratos, which brought an amazing sound out of the instrument. The intensity did not drop – not even for a second – Karmen even intensified it with selected dynamics and gradations which she formed spontaneously and naturally. The musician's temperament was visible especially when she performed Sarasate's Gypsy Airs and Franck's Sonata. Cellist Karmen Pečar proved herself to be an incredible musician. Her performances are a proof that by all means she is not merely a performer, but a mature interpreter who gives the music its own impressions in such an independent way that she impressed the audience also at this concert.
Živa Ploj
Symphony Orchestra of Slovene National Theatre in Maribor / Uroš Lajovic / Shostakovich
Soloist Karmen Pečar is unusually talented. She has a superior knowledge, reliable memory, great temperament, and an incredible ear for music. She performed an incredibly demanding Shostakovich’s Concerto on a level which tells us that her interpretation will gradually mature even further and without any doubt. The success in her artistic maturity that Karmen Pečar has already achieved was proven by her meaningful moderato with cadenza which already outlines a mature and suggestive performance as a reflection of her deep experience of the Shostakovich’s Concerto.
Janko Šetinc
Slovenian Philharmonic Orchestra, Alan Francis / Tchaikovsky – Variations on a Rococo Theme / 18 December 2001
Karmen Pečar is an incredibly talented musician. Her performance is light, rich in tone, and pure. If I would say that she still has to work on her maturity, it would be more of an anticipation rather than the exact truth. This young artist surprises with maturity and musical adulthood; she has opened several possibilities that are only given to those who were gifted with the arts at their birth.
Pavel Mihelčič
RTV Slovenia Symphony Orchestra, Sian Edwards, conductor / Dvořák / Cankarjev dom, Ljubljana / May 2004
Karmen delivered a heavenly performance of the dream music sheet of every cellist. Already for quite some time now, Karmen Pečar has no longer been only a young and perspective musician, but a self-confident one reaching highly above any mediocrity. She is a precious musician out of whom the music is simply bursting. She is a star and a personality who connects people with the arts in a common and momentarily captured divine essence.
Jure Dobovišek (DELO)
Symphony Orchestra of Slovene National Theatre in Maribor, Israel Yinon /
Schelomo – Bloch/ 8 January 2005
The passion of the orchestra was brushing a dilated sound, the performance of Karmen Pečar was brilliant and already proven by the depth of the initial solo. She was looking for a gentleness that I had never seen in a cellist before.
Jure Dobovišek
RTV Slovenia Symphony Orchestra, En Shao, conductor / Sojar-Voglar
Our cellist Karmen Pečar performed a music sheet that was written for her by Črt Sojar Voglar (the premiere was in June 2005). His concerto for cello and orchestra is technically brilliant, compact and refreshing. The cellist however takes command of the place in every way. Her performance is impressive and technically independent.
Pavel Mihelčič
Spirit of Europe Orchestra, Martin Sieghart, conductor / Shostakovich / 10 March 2008
We may say that it was a very good decision to choose the work of Shostakovich as it gave cellist Karmen Pečar a possibility to present herself as one of the most perspective musicians of the young generation, and the orchestra to reveal its qualities. ... Karmen Pečar has submerged entirely into the music and kept control over the content with lyrical and virtuous details, and over morbid dreams that are expressing hell and fear with the help of silence and gentleness.
Jože Štucin
Slovenian Philharmonic Orchestra, Lovrenc Arnič, conductor / Khachaturian / November 2011
The performance of Karmen Pečar of Khacaturian’s Concerto for Cello and Orchestra, which is rarely performed, gave the event even more musical flexibility and spirit. Through a technically most mature performance, the cellist mainly showed some kind of a concentrated energy. With it, she constantly created dynamics in the formation of the melody, especially in the formation of the first theme. Externally, this engagement reflected in a decisive tone which however quickly became too blunt in lower positions. The tone mode, which many other kinds of music could not cope with, was somehow coded in this motoric music by Khachaturian.
Primož Trdan
Characteristics of great performers are always inspiring and impressive, but when they are expressed in a 14-year-old cellist, we witness a supernatural reality. Karmen Pečar possesses an incredible musical maturity and embraces intellectual and artistic qualities that we cannot explain. She simply could not have learned the things she knows. This young artist was born with a cello and was given an incredible inheritance that others must simply learn.
Tatjana Alajbeg
Violin music played on a cello / 5 May 1999
The works were performed perfectly. This young cellist showed an extraordinary dedication and depth in every bar. The meaningful performance was enhanced with an excellent command of the bow and vibratos, which brought an amazing sound out of the instrument. The intensity did not drop – not even for a second – Karmen even intensified it with selected dynamics and gradations which she formed spontaneously and naturally. The musician's temperament was visible especially when she performed Sarasate's Gypsy Airs and Franck's Sonata. Cellist Karmen Pečar proved herself to be an incredible musician. Her performances are a proof that by all means she is not merely a performer, but a mature interpreter who gives the music its own impressions in such an independent way that she impressed the audience also at this concert.
Živa Ploj
Symphony Orchestra of Slovene National Theatre in Maribor / Uroš Lajovic / Shostakovich
Soloist Karmen Pečar is unusually talented. She has a superior knowledge, reliable memory, great temperament, and an incredible ear for music. She performed an incredibly demanding Shostakovich’s Concerto on a level which tells us that her interpretation will gradually mature even further and without any doubt. The success in her artistic maturity that Karmen Pečar has already achieved was proven by her meaningful moderato with cadenza which already outlines a mature and suggestive performance as a reflection of her deep experience of the Shostakovich’s Concerto.
Janko Šetinc
Slovenian Philharmonic Orchestra, Alan Francis / Tchaikovsky – Variations on a Rococo Theme / 18 December 2001
Karmen Pečar is an incredibly talented musician. Her performance is light, rich in tone, and pure. If I would say that she still has to work on her maturity, it would be more of an anticipation rather than the exact truth. This young artist surprises with maturity and musical adulthood; she has opened several possibilities that are only given to those who were gifted with the arts at their birth.
Pavel Mihelčič
RTV Slovenia Symphony Orchestra, Sian Edwards, conductor / Dvořák / Cankarjev dom, Ljubljana / May 2004
Karmen delivered a heavenly performance of the dream music sheet of every cellist. Already for quite some time now, Karmen Pečar has no longer been only a young and perspective musician, but a self-confident one reaching highly above any mediocrity. She is a precious musician out of whom the music is simply bursting. She is a star and a personality who connects people with the arts in a common and momentarily captured divine essence.
Jure Dobovišek (DELO)
Symphony Orchestra of Slovene National Theatre in Maribor, Israel Yinon /
Schelomo – Bloch/ 8 January 2005
The passion of the orchestra was brushing a dilated sound, the performance of Karmen Pečar was brilliant and already proven by the depth of the initial solo. She was looking for a gentleness that I had never seen in a cellist before.
Jure Dobovišek
RTV Slovenia Symphony Orchestra, En Shao, conductor / Sojar-Voglar
Our cellist Karmen Pečar performed a music sheet that was written for her by Črt Sojar Voglar (the premiere was in June 2005). His concerto for cello and orchestra is technically brilliant, compact and refreshing. The cellist however takes command of the place in every way. Her performance is impressive and technically independent.
Pavel Mihelčič
Spirit of Europe Orchestra, Martin Sieghart, conductor / Shostakovich / 10 March 2008
We may say that it was a very good decision to choose the work of Shostakovich as it gave cellist Karmen Pečar a possibility to present herself as one of the most perspective musicians of the young generation, and the orchestra to reveal its qualities. ... Karmen Pečar has submerged entirely into the music and kept control over the content with lyrical and virtuous details, and over morbid dreams that are expressing hell and fear with the help of silence and gentleness.
Jože Štucin
Slovenian Philharmonic Orchestra, Lovrenc Arnič, conductor / Khachaturian / November 2011
The performance of Karmen Pečar of Khacaturian’s Concerto for Cello and Orchestra, which is rarely performed, gave the event even more musical flexibility and spirit. Through a technically most mature performance, the cellist mainly showed some kind of a concentrated energy. With it, she constantly created dynamics in the formation of the melody, especially in the formation of the first theme. Externally, this engagement reflected in a decisive tone which however quickly became too blunt in lower positions. The tone mode, which many other kinds of music could not cope with, was somehow coded in this motoric music by Khachaturian.
Primož Trdan
