He was born on March 27, 1973, in Ljubljana and spent his childhood in Škofja Loka. His mother, painter Dora Plestenjak, had a significant influence on his artistic talent, which developed in a musical direction. He started playing the guitar because of his older brother, Domen, and initially, it did not go very well: "I never practiced enough, and my teacher Uroš Lovšin, who was a member of the legendary band Buldožer, almost gave up on me, so I had to bring home a signed practice log for my parents, where the exact number of minutes I had practiced was recorded. Before my first performances, I was so nervous that I couldn't eat or sleep for a week before the event."
Over the years, his first successes came, including several first and second prizes at Yugoslav classical guitar competitions. After finishing primary music school in Škofja Loka, he was accepted into the Secondary School of Music and Ballet in Ljubljana, where he studied guitar under Professor Tomaž Šegula.
During high school, Jan's desire to create music began to awaken. He took his first steps into the world of jazz. He formed the Interaction jazz group, collaborated with members of the band Quatebriga, and worked with the Big Band of RTV Slovenia. Almost as a joke, he sent a garage recording of one of his compositions to the prestigious Berklee College of Music in Boston. To his surprise, he was awarded an American talent scholarship and invited to study in Boston. At the age of eighteen, he went to the USA, where he completed two years' worth of guitar, arranging, production, and vocal studies in just one year. "I had the great honor of studying under Professor Jon Damian, who, among others, inspired Bill Frisell." After returning to Slovenia, he continued his studies in Austria at the Music Conservatory in Klagenfurt.
Creative Work
In his career spanning more than thirty years, Jan has recorded 16 studio albums. Four of them achieved gold status, and three went platinum. He is the author of the lyrics and music and, for most of his albums, also the arranger and producer. He has very rarely performed songs written by other authors. To bring freshness to the sound, he occasionally invited other producers to collaborate on his albums. His creative repertoire includes more than 400 songs, and he has written many for other performers as well. He has recorded over 50 music videos, and more than 30 of his songs have become radio hits.
