100-year-old music teacher says the arts always kept her spirits lifted

At 100 years old, Maria Trebuss says that if she could go back in time, she wouldn’t change a thing.

“I was very proud of what I did because I never hurt anyone,” she said. “Never in my life.”

On her kitchen table, she sifts through a binder containing a collage of mementos from her time as a music teacher and opera singer, an artist, and a writer.

“‘We’ll miss you,’” she read from one of the farewell letters from a former choir member. “I miss you too.”

The centenarian said that during challenging times, music and the arts always helped keep her grounded.

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“Music helped me spiritually. Not only spiritually, but kept me being me,” Trebuss said. “I didn’t lose myself.”

Trebuss was born on July 15, 1924 in Hungary. She came to Canada as a refugee in 1950, after Hungary was occupied by the Soviet Union.

She said it was a “difficult” period, leaving her friends and family behind to depart overseas.

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Trebuss first began singing while living away from her parents, who were renting out a flat in Belgium. She said much of her childhood was spent with a nanny named Laura Maria at her home in the mountains.

With no children around to play with, Trebuss said she spent lots of time singing while roaming the grassy lawns with the dog, Hector, learning different lyrics as people sang while they worked in the vineyards.

“My favourite (songs) were what I was making up,” Trebuss said. “My favourite time was to lie in the lawn, in the grass, and look at the sky and the clouds.

“The clouds made the story for me, and I added the text. It was a beautiful time.”

She said she could always see a story in the sky, and often sang about a prince saving a princess.

Her singing brought many people joy, she said. To Trebuss’ excitement, she was asked to perform in a nearby town. Her talent caught the ear of a good Samaritan, who paid for her schooling.

Years later, Trebuss said she takes pride in the time she spent working as a music teacher in Regina, but feels even more fortunate to have been given the knowledge to do so.

“I was never wealthy,” she said. “I had wealth in my mind because – thank God – I learned a lot, and I am proud of it.”

She conducted many choirs, and even hosted the first ever ball for the Regina Symphony Orchestra.

On top of Trebuss’ own exhibits at the Mackenzie Art Gallery, she also taught children’s art classes after getting her fine arts degree at the University of Regina.

While she sketched and painted with the kids, she said she always learned something herself.

“It was really very successful,” she said. “Very, very successful.”

Her bylines are published in the Regina Leader-Post, and her collection of article clippings are held with care in her folder of memories.

In 1950, she married her husband Paul when he arrived in Regina from a communist concentration camp. He died in 1990. The two had two children together, who now live in Toronto.

After her many years of teaching, Trebuss said the arts has always brought out the best in people.

“I am not a politician. I am an artist. I am a developer for anything good for people,” she said. “Not for one, not for the Canadians, but for everybody.”

At 100 years old, Trebuss said it would be a “miracle” if she was still singing, but her binder of mementos is something she holds close from her days teaching, writing, and performing.