Vinko Žganec

He started to be interested in music early in his childhood and jotted down his first folk song in 1908.

The composer and ethnomusicologist Béla Bartók kept in close contact with him while collecting folk songs along the border of Hungary and Croatia.

During the span of his research, Žganec collected, recorded, and wrote down more than 19,000 songs, including many Croatian tamburica; these have been preserved for future generations to be used and studied.

Žganec became the first director of the Institute of Folklore Research, and was an active participant in the Folklorist Society of Croatia.

Similar to Žganec's work was that of Franjo Kuhač, another man who devoted his life to research on the national cultural heritage.