Aleksandra Naumovski, Ljubljana, Slovenia

graduate Academy of Music Ljubljana, piano teacher, author of music textbooks and piano methods for children

When as a fifteen years old girl I walked into her magic workshop of life and music, it was immediately clear to me that such work is unique. I began to grasp things that were completely strange to me and yet familiar at the same time. I experienced the beauty of silence, its "sound" - which up to this time was terrifying, alien, yet quotidian. Marina is not a "pedagogue", as we know them. She is a great friend with a knowing about and a feeling of music in a different way.

Magdalena Klancisar, Ljubljana, Slovenja

flutiste, graduate Academy of Music Ljubljana

In Marina's summer course in Grožnjan I got to know many new, beautiful faces of music. I also realized that these faces are actually already within us - hidden treasures, which we do not even know they exist, until someone uncovers them for us. Then music becomes richer and filled with meaning - life meaning, becomes an experience and opens the path to our selves and to others. This is when I discover its all-encompassing wealth and feel happiness in my heart. But nobody shows us the path to reach this point - except if one is born under the lucky star and by coincidence meets Marina, who together with us - with meditation, improvisation and a close collaboration with the group searches for the key, how to play in a self-experiential way - from within oneself, and yet at the same time faithful to the composer's idea of the music.

Tatjana Nikic,  Zagreb, Croata

graduate Academy of Music Zagreb, was coach at the National Theatre Zagreb,  performs internationally as  jazz pianist

I met Marina Horak when I was a student at the Music Academy in Zagreb, Croatia, in 1992. I found her special way of teaching very interesting and I started to work with her privately in München and in Croatia during the summer. After I graduated form Zagreb Music Academy in 1995, I left for Italy to study with Konstantin Bogino, but I was still in contact with Ms. Horak, working with her, until I left for the United States.

Her musicality, knowledge, imagination, willing to help, that's something nobody can forget, even having just one lesson. She is one of the few teachers who teach not just piano, but life. Technically, she is always able to solve problems, no matter if it is fingering, hand position, tempo. She is able to find in people some hidden potentials, which others don't know how to find, and one can change instantly, and everything starts to flow and becomes much easier, especially because it is not just matter of the right moment, but the matter of true knowledge and intelligent understanding of the person herself. The whole miracle of her teaching is that it brings some new knowledge which may stay forever, and something learned in one particular piece can be used somewhere else.

Gerhard Peter, Memmingen, Germany

graduate Landeskonservatorium Klagenfurt, Austria, performer and piano teacher in Memmingen

In four and a half years, while taking lessons with Marina Horak, she did not accompany and support me only in instrumental development, but was also - as she was also to many others of her pupils - a motherly friend and caretaker of the soul and a teacher of life. With her holistic approach to teaching she was able to give support both my pianistic and my personal, human process of maturation. She did this in such a way and such a form, that the time with her shaped me more profoundly and with a more long-lasting effect than most periods of my formation as a human being and pianist.

In her work Marina indicates the paths how to open outwards the channels within oneself - of spirit, soul and feeling, in order to draw from one's own inner creative source and thus establish contact with the expressive power of music and be able to develop a personal musical concept. She is a 'receiver' for pupils' feelings and sensations, showing during making music and 'sends' them back in a way that makes it possible for the pupil to use them creatively.

Spirit and body, musical concept and instrumental technique, are for Marina Horak an inseparable unity. This is expressed in every fibre of her work, of her teaching. The development of human maturity and musical concept go hand-in-hand with the development of a perfectly natural, relaxed, sound-orientated piano technique, including the whole body and the awareness of breathing.

Working with Marina Horak opened for me the door to studies at the conservatoire - although late and through the back-door, as it were, since I was already over 30 years old - and to the profession of a piano teacher. Judging by my own experience, Marina Horak represents a lucky chance for every pupil and piano student, who entrusts himself into her hands.

Heiko Stralendorff, München, Nemčija

Graduate Hochschule für Musik Freiburg, post-graduate Hochschule für Musik München, pianist of the Bell arte ensemble, coach at the  Hochschule für Musik München, concert pianist

I was glad when I got to know Marina Horak. For a period of six years I regularly took lessons with her. Whether assimilating new works or preparing a concert performance, whether playing solo or chamber music repertoire - regardless, I always benefited from working with her. Her work with music is based on the respect for the compositions and their notation and she strives to generate within the performer a vivid conception of the piece, whereby the creative dealing with images and sensations this side of music and beyond.

Orietta Caianiello, Rome, Italy

Professor of chamber music,  Conservatorio di Bari / Scuola di musica Testaccio Rome, member of Ianus Duo and Freon ensemble for new music, concert pianist

Few teachers have so indelibly marked my artistic personality, hardly any of them could show me those subtle points of contact, which connect life and art, and to show me that progress in the musical-interpretative field must needs coincide with the development of the whole being: in every moment of our didactic relationship, Marina was a wonderful example of this thought, in all integrity.  At all times she was capable, both as an artist and an individual, to recognize and to indicate the connections between music and life, between the interpretative capability and the understanding of self.

Marina's generous and profound perspective, linked with the "ultimate meaning" held by the role of art in our being, reflects in a vital manner the full motivation of our existence as musicians, including the exertion, the contentment and the humility it contains, as well as the human, spiritual and ethical growth, which belong to it. When mentioning the qualities of Marina's musical "soul", at the same time I must not forget the most solid competence, the refinement of esthetical thought, capacity to guide in instrumental technique at the highest level, psychological perspicacity with which she penetrates explores the pupils, the passion which infuses her teaching and finally: her performing talent and masterly interpretation.

Antonella Pagano, Naples, Italy

Graduate Conservatorio di musica  Naples, DAAD sbursar and post-graduate Hochschule der Künste Berlin, pedagogue at various Italian conservatoires, concert pianist

During the piano master class of Peter Feuchtwanger in Sion (Switzerland) I made the acquaintance with his then assistant  Marina Horak and heard her play. Her beautiful, intense and the power of her musical temperament attracted me greatly. Her teaching made a great impression on me with the precision and the love of detail, leading to the understanding of musical structures and connections.  Later on, when M. Horak moved from London to Munich, I became her pupil and could for many years enjoy her lessons. She was most certainly the most important influence on my pianistic path. Her profound understanding of music and her great ability with which she finds the causes of and solutions to pianistic problems, took me far indeed and enriched me greatly. I was enraptured after each lesson. Alongside her extensive knowledge about music and piano playing I much appreciated her capability to "meet" a pupil.  BY this I mean that pedagogical gift, how to recognize the pupil, to sense his difficulties and capabilities and that particular art, how to accompany him step by step in his development. Therefore the lessons with her were a deep personal experience. Her vivid imagination stimulated my own creativity and I enjoyed practicing very much. Time and time again I felt grateful for the prompt solutions of interpretative problem during the lessons. Working with her, marked me as a pianist and in my pedagogical activities.

Valery Brasey, Fribourg, Switzerland

Professor of piano and chamber music Conservatoire de Musique Fribourg, concert performer and coach-accompanist

With Marina a completely new manner of working started for me: I learned how to breathe and how to centre myself, how to free physical and mental energies and invest them into my playing, how to find natural gestures and appropriate fingerings, how to think in inner images, colours, deep feelings - and all this with the goal to make the playing authentic for myself and at the same time respectful of the style and musical language of each composer.

This kind of work that has a "long breath" opened up numerous horizons. I often perform in concerts, particularly with singers, by the same token I teach children and adults. Researching with Marina Horak continues to be useful and precious in both fields and it constantly encourages me not to stop on my path. It is my opinion that Marina Horak is an extra-ordinary pedagogue, both in terms of quantity of knowledge and of the research approaches adopted by her, as well as the intensity with which she encourages us to walk our road of development.

Thierry A. Güdel, Vancouver, Canada

Piano pedagogue and concert artist; founder and director of the European Piano Academy Vancouver, Canada

Marina Horak's teaching approach can be, according to my experiences, be described as unique. She knows how to guide with a vast knowledge and creativity without offering me - or other pupils - prefabricated solutions. With a great capacity of feeling emphaty  and a deep understanding of the psychological links, she succeeds in using for every single situation the appropriate means that are always connected with the music or the student.

Numerous "tricks", profound insights into the musical expression, Marina's capacity of linking the music, expression, technique and body - all this added to my expertise as a teacher of both very young beginners and professional students, whom I teach with inquisitiveness and interest.  My professional self-confidence, which I acquired as a pedagogue and as a performer, is based on the knowledge and experience shared with me by Marina during my lessons.

Ariadne Weigert, Bad Wörishofen, Germany

Professor at the Berfusfachschule für Musik Bad Königshofen, Germany, concert performer

Marina's entirely personal, completely pupil-orientated (tuned in) work, often begins where high education college teachers do not wish to continue working. Next to a very solid technical training I gathered during this time a great amount of experiences about psychological connections between the music and myself as a person, which even to this day  proves advantageous in my work with my own students.