Ing. Rony Marton

“I chose a Czech roommate on purpose so that I could train Czech. My progress would not be so noticeable without practice, so my roommate was always Czech. That was one thing. The other thing - it was also for selfish reasons. Most commonly I would choose a student who lived in the surroundings of Prague which meant that I had the room to myself during the weekends.”

“When I won the finals of the competition Hledáme nové talenty (“We Are Looking for New Talents”) in 1970 and was awarded the first prize, the finals were recorded by Czech Television. I had a problem there because I could not sing in English but only in Czech. I said I did not have a Czech text. I got a text from the television, it did not suit me, I said it did not match the original. I asked them if I could create the text on my own. They allowed me to do it but only in Czech. I prepared the Czech text with the help of my friend Jarda Křemena who corrected the texts for me so that one could enjoy listening to them. So, I sang in Czech which Karel Vlach noticed and gave me the first offer in television.”

“In 1973, Mr Karel Vlach organized a recording of the song Hastrmane, tatrmane (“Water Goblin, Merry Andrew”). The song was written by Mr Krůta, and its music was composed by Zdeněk Merta. The first album with this song was released in 1973. It was a big success. Maybe because it was new, or I do not know why. To make it short - it was unpredictable. One cannot consider everything. To cut a long story short, it was a success! According to the notes in my notebook, many albums were sold, at least 50,000 to 100,000 albums. It was an enormous success for that time, probably even nowadays. Now there is even more competition.”

“‘I have various offers here,‘ he said and named different countries including the Soviet Union, in short, the Eastern Block including Yugoslavia. I asked him whether he could recommend me something so that my studies had a good result. He said: ‘Do you know John Amos Comenius? He was the teacher of nations; he was born in today´s Czechoslovakia but he died in the Netherlands.‘ I said I did not know him at all. ‘The Czechoslovak Republic is a country with a very good tradition in the educational system so I recommend you going there.‘ I said: ‘Well, I will obey you and go there. ‘”