Nit’ je vedro, nit’ oblacno,
Nit’ je tamna noc,
Nit’ je sunce, nit’ je mjesec,
Nit’ je b’jeli dan,
Vec je ono Sokolovic,
Mlad Ibrahim-beg.

Zanio se, unio se,
U svoj golem nam,
Sto on ljubi sultaniju,
Sultan Zulejhu!

“Kazi Zulko, kazi duso,
sta sam tebi ja?”
“Ti si, Ibro, alem sunce,
sto nad nama sja!”

Sevdah heritage is at least 500 years old and covers some 4000 known texts in existence today.

Sevdalinka repertoires performed by modern artists (i.e. within the last 50 years or so) have largely been narrowed down to a small set of some 50 songs.

Variations on the theme within each Sevdalinka are also plentiful.

From variations in vocal interpretation to variety of backing arrangements, Sevdalinka has obtained many new musical forms in recent years.

However, which of these forms are true to the essence of Sevdalinka as a song and what ought to be ‘appropriate’ is a matter of great debate these days.

I will try and make my arguments for and against each approach, with reference to interpretations which I have heard and seen so far.

Traditional approach – solo singing with no accompaniment

Pure Sevdalinka in its original form was a song performed by a solo singer, who was storytelling through his or her singing.

This is the simplest form of presenting Sevdalinka to audience and is very effective as there are no musical backing distractions from the story and the message within the song.

The melody played a massive part in this form of interpretation along with perhaps minimal elements of vocal variations or freestyle.

Many interpreters find this form of singing very difficult as it totally exposes their vocal and interpretation abilities (or inabilities as its sometimes the case).

Many interpreters perceive this form as boring and prefer to be accompanied by elaborate backings in order to cover up their vocal weaknesses.

Sargija and Saz accompaniments

Sargija existed in Bosnia before Saz and would have been the most original form of accompaniment for sevdalinka vocal performances.

Nowadays it is not uncommon to find Saz players who are still capable of playing Saz and singing along their accompaniment, so proving backing for another solo singer.

Saz was probably preferred to Sargija over time as it has a more resonant sound and gives off a more classy feel, somewhat like a Harpsichord is well suited to classical music due to its harmonic richness.

Saz also looks more grandiose than Sargija, giving the accompanist a more prominent image than when he played Sargija.

Saz and Sargija are predominantly harmonic instruments, but it is possible to play melodies on them too, which would have given rise to parallel playing of melodies along with the singing, but also to playing of the so called vorspiel before each song or each verse within the songs.

The role of a vorspiel is to break up the monotony, give the singer time to rest between each verse and maybe allow the audience to have some mezze or take a sip of their coffee while listening.

It is important to outline at this point that Sevdalinka performances would have been delivered within someone’s house or a small Royal premise, and the audience numbers would probably be no larger than 20 in size, giving a very close and intimate impression on both audience and the performer.

It would not be unusual for the audience to participate in the singing also, giving the performances participatory and contributory dimension.

This participation would have lead towards emergence of (subtle) lyric variations, which we can observe in many Sevdalinkas of today.

Those variations may have been based on the local geography of Bosnia, people or customs, which local people would have been keen to put into a more permanent form.

Accordion accompaniments

With arrival of Austo-Hungarian Empire, Bosnia got a new ‘national instrument’ – accordion.

This meant that Sevdalinka now obtained a potential accompanying instrument which could be used as a full solo instrument, giving it a more prominent impact on the musical form of typical Sevdalinka.

With accordion Sevdalinka accompanist gained a much more important role within the typical melody and  accompaniment Sevdalinka duet and became, in some cases, the main focus of attention.

At this point solo accordion performances of various ‘kolo’ compositions gained more traction and focus shifted towards a more dance oriented heritage in Bosnia as opposed to more typical and traditional Sevdalinka storytelling through a song.

With accordion the melody and use of ornaments within Sevdalinka melodies became more prominent as (mainly) Serbian accordionists, lead by Jovica Petkovic, developed a virtuoso style of playing accordion (probably inspired by their masterful playing of Serbian kolo).

Through this ‘stamping’ of Sevdalinkas with kolo-like interpretations, Serbian accordionists arguably took far too much focus away from singing and shifted it towards accordion playing, causing the lyrics and song to be drowned within endless thrills and ornaments of accordion playing.

Tamburica orchestra accompaniment

Tamburica is an instrument similar to mandolin in size and sound.

It is an instrument commonly played in Croatia, Hungary and North Serbia, but often can be heard in the context of providing musical accompaniment for some of the popular Sevdalinka interpretations from the 20th century.

Tamburica orchestras have a very mellow and not overpowering sound to them, which compliments solo singing, especially solo female singing.

Tamburica orchestras are not frequent in Bosnia, so this type of accompaniment is somewhat a foreign interpretation of Sevdalinkas similar to the use of clarinet to play some of the Sevdalinka tunes which can often be heard in Serbia.

Even though not native to Bosnia (which is the same that can be said of accordion until the 19th century), tamburica orchestras provide somehow appropriate Sevdalinka musical accompaniments in many cases.

Classical arrangements

Serbian arrangements of Sevdalinkas did not only come in the form of very elabourate accordion accompaniments which over-powered the singer in many cases, but they also came in form of use of classical ensembles to accompany certain interpretations.

This gave Sevdalinka a very ‘royal’ sound and made some Sevdalinkas really stand out from the rest of the songs at the time highlighting them as excellent examples of incredibly high quality, timeless melodies which lend themselves to very organic harmonic treatment.

Classical ensemble arrangements would often include accordion as an added melody instrument, but often used in a less elabourate manner than when only accordion and voice are used.

This type of arrangement highlighted the operatic nature of highly melismatic Sevdalinka melodies, especially within the very tenuated songs.

It helped propel some performers into real royalties of the entertainment scene in the 20th century and provided for very long term, highly valuable materials which sound very good even today.

Modern accompaniment variations

It is not strange to find Sevdalinka arrangements done in various modern arrangements with varying accompaniments today.

Jazz bands have been used for accompanying certain Sevdalinka interpretations.

Jazz quartets have started to incorporate heavy Sevdalinka arrangements into their repertoires, while even heavy metal albums have been influenced heavily by Sevdalinkas.

Unfortunately some of the ‘bedroom producing’ youth of the day are also trying to incorporate Sevdalinka elements into their techno tracks, leading to great elements of confusion and dilution of value of the heritage.

Arguably even worse form of devaluing Sevdalinka through mixing it with other styles of music comes from interpreters who purposely ‘foreignise’ Sevdalinkas into non-related musical styles such as flamenco, making a musical parallel between the two, a parallel which makes no sense at all.

Many heavily synthesised verzions of Sevdalinka arrangements can also be found today and are, by and large, examples of trying to move Sevdalinka into the very dangerous and destructive, quasi musical, post modern style of music known as Turbo Folk.

Mirza joined Ognjen Tvrtkovic in presenting a ‘Sevdalinka masterclass’ with DJ Ritu playing some of the pre-selected tracks that Ognjen and Mirza brought in.

The program was incredibly enjoyable and we have obtained much useful and positive feedback about it.

The event yielded an interesting outcome in so far that DJ Ritu has liked Sevdalinka so much that she would like to make Sevdalinka a part of her regular DJ repertoire, so World of Sevdah is due to re-appear on the program later on in the year with some live performances and more interesting facts about Bosnian musical heritage.

We have managed to save the audio version of the program into an MP3 file which you will be able to download from this web site soon.

Zvijezda tjera mjeseca
Za goru ga otjera

Za goricom vodica,
Na vodici curica
Bijelo lice umiva

‘Daj mi curo vodice
Iz te bijele ručice’

Nedam dragi ni kapi,
Nek’ ti duša izlapi
Zbog sinoćne besjedje

Zbog sinoćne besjedje
I rumene jabuke

Drugoj daješ rumene,
Meni daješ uvele
Uvela ti duša ta

English translation

Star chases the Moon
It chases it behind the hill

Behind the hill is water
Upon the water a girl
Washing her white face

‘Give me some water girl
From your white hand’

‘I won’t give you a drop dear
May your soul fade away
Because of what you said last night

Because of what you said last night
And the ripe apple

You give the red apples to another girl
And to me only the stale ones
May your soul become stale

Original Bosnian lyrics

As sung by Salih Kahrimanović along Saz accompaniment in 1907. Recorded by Franz Hampe from Berlin for “Gramophone Company”. Recording was found by Risto Pekka Pennanen. Source: 101 sevdalinka. Author: Munib Maglajlić. Sarajevo, 2010, page. 30 and 130.

Snijeg pade na behar, na voće,
podaj, Bože, svakome šta hoće!

A i meni šta je meni drago,
voljela bih neg’ carevo blago!

Šta će meni svo carevo blago,
kad ja nemam šta mi srcu drago?

Meni drago jedno momče mlado,
ja da mi ga Bog u sreći dade!

English translation

Snow fell upon Spring blossom, upon fruit,
may God give to everyone what they want!

And grant to me, what is dear to me,
I would love it more than King’s treasure!

Why do I need King’s treasure,
When I don’t have what my heart likes?

My heart wants a young man,
may God give him in happiness to me!

Original Bosnian lyrics

As sung by Silvana Armenulić (most likely based on narrations by Ismet Alajbegović).

Zapjevala sojka ptica
misli zora je
aman, aman,
misli zora je

‘Ustaj Fato,
ustaj zlato,
spremaj darove
aman, aman,
spremaj darove’

‘Ja sam mlada i sirota,
nemam darova
aman, aman,
nemam darova’

‘Kad si mlada
i sirota sto se udaješ
aman, aman,
što se udaješ’

‘Udala me stara majka
nisam ni znala
aman, aman,
nisam ni znala’

‘Kad mi ruho dodavaše,
mišljah Bajram je!
aman, aman,
mišljah Bajram je!’

English translation

Nightingale began to sing
Thinking the dawn has come x2

‘Wake up Fato
Wake up my darling
Prepare the gifts’ x2

‘I’m young and poor
I don’t have gifts’ x2

‘If you are young and poor
why are you getting married’ x2

‘My old mother married me off
I didn’t even know’ x2

‘When they handed me the gowns
I thought it was Eid’ x2

Amira Medunjanin sings Sevdalinkas and has had world acclaimed albums and concerts

We are big fans of Amira Medunjanin, whom we have seen perform live in London a few years back now. We consider her to be a living legend due to her lovely voice and success in world music arena.  Amira was kind enough to give us this exclusive interview in which she reveals her relationship with singing Sevdalinkas in amongst other songs from Serbia (Vranje) and Macedonia.

Your album ‘Rosa’ could arguably be called ‘the most significant world music recording in history’. What’s a typical day of the main artist from that album like?

I appreciate your opinion about ‘Rosa’ album.

I have to give my thanks and respect to all the artists on this album, since without them I would not have been able to bring out the emotion which makes the core of this musical creation.

It is hard to avoid technology in the everyday routine of life, but the best form of relaxing does not come while one is with a laptop or communicating over FaceBook.

Our lives need more substance than that.

I am afraid that the new technologies lead us towards isolation.

Many people in the Western world feel some sort of isolation and suffer from depression, even though (when one digs past the surface) things have not changed that much.

Everyone tries to be modern and in this new system of values it’s hard to be modern and I think that a regular person finds it hard to follow the advancements of the civilisation.

If we give the highest priority to the unstoppable process of innovation of society, I’m afraid very little is left for us to observe with our own eyes.

I said all of this in order to illustrate how family and friends ought to be the basis for life of every person wanting to function normally within a society, and towards creation of a richer society as a whole.

I see my close friends every day and with a sense of belonging I get certain freedom by doing that, which enriches me as a person through talking and general conversation.

I think that de-socialising is the worst tendency of a person in today’s world.

We don’t have much time in our lives to waste upon worthless and non-creative activities.

Can you describe the creation process of album ‘Rosa’?

Since we are talking about the album, I would like to mention Miss Kim Burton, who contributed enormously to the creation of the album.

A unique creative expression has enriched the musical picture of this album and gave it a special taste which has, lucky for us, been recorded onto it.

Considering we recorded the entire album within three days, all of that time was like a form of a day dreaming and I don’t really have a clear picture about everything that happened, it just looks to me like a beautiful dream.

Experience of all the artists ensured that everything went through without any complications, except that in beautiful, but cold Mostar, I managed to get a lung infection just before the recording process started, so the high temperature heated the atmosphere even more.

I also must add that for recording material like this Mostar has to be the best place on the planet, since it still contains it’s unique personality and the scent of old times.

What’s your most interesting anecdote while recording Sevdalinkas?

There are a number of them, but I can remember the last one.

I was asked to sing one more song at Bosnian Cultural Centre and tried, and I say tried, to sing the song ‘Bogata sam imam svega’, acapella, but I completely forgot the second verse.

I think the audience thought of it as cute, but I must admit I felt really embarrassed.

Your concert in London was unforgettable and entirely perfect. Is it possible for Sevdalinka to be regularly performed on the world’s stages in a similar way to how salsa is represented.

It’s a shame that artists from Bosnia don’t get much performance space within Western events.

I think that we are capable of bringing a lot of good and positive material to the stage for people to see.

All of us are aware how rich a country we are and what we are capable of demonstrating.

I think that Bosnia is still unknown amongst many Westerners and that the world has become so small that we can still somehow send a message and describe the philosophy of centuries long multicultural life within our country.

We have much to offer to the world and point to some values which are of core significance to the whole world.

We have survived very difficult times in our history and have still come out, after all that, as winners.

When I say ‘winners’ I firstly think about dedication towards preservation of life in our region, followed by rich heritage and tradition which has been feeding us with positive energy and given us additional strength to overcome all the difficulties which we faced.

The experience which we have and can offer is vast.

Do you consider yourself to be a traditional or modern Sevdalinka singer and why?

When we are talking about Sevdalinka artists, I think it is difficult to use that term today.

We must say that the time of the legends such as Jozo Penava, Safet Isovic and Nada Mamula has passed and what is left over are just the beautiful memories about those who have as a generation of people prevented these lovely songs from being forgotten.

I have learnt a lot from these people and not only have they given me the pleasure in listening to their Sevdalinka works, but they have also given me the inner peace which enables me to more easily weather the challenging times in my life.

It’s interesting to observe that we all used to be much closer and aware of each other back then, as though there existed some sort of a net which was connecting people and made the society unbreakable.

What would you like to achieve with your Sevdalinka performances in future?

Before all my only wish is to enjoy Sevdah, however selfish that might sound.

Nothing apart from that.

Everything else is secondary.

Every time I perform I want to ensure that people who came to listen to what I do feel at least a part of my love for Sevdalinka.

At least if they can see the universal message and strength of all those songs and how an advanced a society we (Bosnians) are, when we have been reaching those kinds of advanced values some 400 years ago.

Values which can be measured alongside utopia, keeping in mind that all these songs came from people themselves, from ordinary folk, whose only aim was to describe and transmit their emotions and their view of the world within a few verses.

Those songs make that world seem as though it’s just round the corner from here.

That sort of art and culture is present in all Bosnians and makes one of the core values of our society, while giving us the strength to aim for the better and more just world in the future.

Amira’s official web site

This article was not intended to be written as a formal reference document, but is rather an account of a ‘reformed Sevdah performer’ (myself) who had taken a long time to realise the information presented in the paragraphs to follow.

Historical overview

Bosnia is an incredibly culturally rich and diverse country, which can be considered a ‘European cradle of civilisation’.

Bosnia has existed as a unique geopolitical entity for eleven centuries and was the place where the Charter of Kulin Ban was drafted.

It is the first ever written charter from the territory covered by ex-Yugoslavia.

Bosnian kings were some of the most progressive thinkers at the time and have left behind numerous priceless cultural relics and rich traditions.

Empirical influences and Bosnian rule

Throughout centuries Bosnia found itself in many unusual political positions.

The presence and spread of the Ottoman Empire and its culture influenced the development of music culture in Bosnia-Herzegovina, particularly a specific lyric form named “Sevdalinka”.

Bosnia was also part of the Austro-Hungarian empire, which brought accordion to the country.

In the past Bosnia also ruled Serbia and Croatia as part of its territory.

Throughout these moments of seismic cultural shifts, developments and movements, Bosnia maintained its unique identity and developed its own, highly unique culture.

This culture covered various aspects of life style including food, music (Sevdalinka – Bosnian traditional song), traditional outfits, various traditions such as Bosnian coffee drinking, architecture, interior design, hand crafts, furniture, etc.

Bosnian people stood strong, proud and determined to maintain, develop and continue their own values and culture, without infringing other people’s cultures.

Twentieth century mayhem

The twentieth century brought much turmoil to Bosnia.

While places like America were going from strength to strength, Bosnia did not miss out on being the epicenter of World War I and World War II.

Just as it recovered somewhat fully from the disastrous effects of World War II, Bosnia suffered an aggression from Serbia and Croatia during early 90s.

I cannot think of many countries in the world which have been through three ravaging wars in a single century in the recent history!

Each of the wars which happened in Bosnia had a silent, but incredibly destructive aspect to
it – ‘cultural genocide’!

This is the topic I would like to cover in detail in this short article.

Destruction of Bosnian culture

As Austro-Hungarian empire arrived to Bosnia, it naturally influenced the Bosnian territory with its own cultural values which were radically different to Sevdah and rapidly diluted Sevdah traditions in Bosnia.

Traditional Sevdah instrumentation (Saz) was abandoned, while Austro-Hungarians essentially imposed the use of accordion, Austrian traditional instrument.

Bosnians, in a move to save Sevdalinka songs from total destruction, adapted their interpretations to accordion and made accordion the ‘modern musical heart of Sevdah’.

The rise of accordion based Sevdalinka accompaniments meant that musical values of Sevdalinka had already been altered somewhat, and were therefore no longer kept to their original form.

However, one could argue that the essence of Sevdalinka was still preserved by most prominent accordion performers that emerged.

Yugoslavian cultural imperialism

After the Austro-Hungarian cultural oppression, Bosnia became ‘the heart of Socialist Federative Republic of Yugoslavia’ at the end of World War II.

This socialist regime was seen by most as ‘soft’, however in practice it meant that people of Yugoslavia were taught to sing partisan and pioneer songs.

These ‘Yugoslavian folk songs’ somehow grew out of this new political form.

Nobody sings these ‘Yugoslavian folk songs’ today, proving that they were never real folk creations.

Yugoslavian regime ‘softly’ brainwashed few generations of Bosnian youth from knowing and understanding almost anything about their real cultural heritage.

Yours truly was one of the victims of this horrible, long-term brain washing campaign, and proactively shunned any association with Sevdalinka in my early stages of musical education.

During the period from 1950s to 1980s, however, there were some very important Sevdalinka recordings made by Radio Sarajevo which now form a part of an important Sevdah cultural archive.

Turbo folk

One of the biggest cultural evils, which lives in the bones of majority of Bosnian youth today started spreading itself some time in the 1980s and continued into the 1990s.

That evil was called ‘Južni Vetar‘ (Southern Wind) and it originated in Serbia, unfortunate country which was equally (if not more) subject to cultural genocide like Bosnia.

Southern Wind essentially ‘lifted’ the sound of Lebanese and Egyptian pop, which, for example, can be regularly heard in various Lebanese sheesha bars in London’s Edgware Road today.

This style of techno, quazi pop-folk, fused horribly together into an idiotically appealing bubblegum of subliminal, openly sexual, semi-musical hooks, flooder the Middle East, Turkey, Greece and Serbia, penetrating as far as Bosnia!

The biggest paradox in it all was the fact that this music was marketed around as ‘narodna muzika’ (folk music)!

Turbo folk – the curse of the modern Balkans

Turbo folk has nothing to do with Bosnian (or even Serbian) folk music.

Unfortunately, it’s still going very strong in Serbia, where Bosnian immigrants, lead by Lepa Brena, built an entire empire from selling this recycled tat to unaware Serbian peasants, who enjoy a good ‘booty shake’ after a hard day’s work in the fields.

Many listeners in Yugoslavia were wise enough to realise the Turbo Folk conspiracy.

Much of the youth opted for listening to Yugoslavian rock music, which was a form of ‘musical safe haven’.

This music was influenced heavily by the parallel hippy movement in America.

It is highly paradoxical that the hippy movement was a form of freedom movement where the rock musicians were taking influences from English and Irish folk music and emergent Black folk of modern America and it in itself became a certain form of ‘turbo folk’.

However, it could be argued that much of the music from bands like Leb i Sol (their adaptations of Macedonian traditional songs in specific) and later Yugoslavian rock groups were actual ‘light forms of Turbo Folk’, just delivered in a more tasteful manner.

Turbo folk musical scales are structured in such a way as to induce somewhat a paranoid mental state in a listener, catalysing use of alcohol and smoking of cigarettes along with increased levels of promiscuity amongst men and women, influenced by sexual images within the music and videos of most turbo folk songs.

I have heard a Serbian musician friend of mine make a comment about his analysis which indicated that musical structure of Turbo Folk music had been one of the aiding elements in creating the ‘warring zombie mentality’ amongst the people of the latest war of 1990s in Bosnia and Croatia.

Unfortunately this ‘zombie state’ can also be observed amongst Bosnian youth of today.

Take a seat in Sarajevo City centre and observe a young girl religiously repeat the lyrics of the latest Turbo Folk song, while staring in the distance with an empty gaze in her eyes.

This empty look is a common product of a human being blindingly consuming and following these agitating, irritating, false and highly sexually suggestive lyrics of this ultra-commercial ‘musical form’.

Light at the end of the tunnel

However, two solid decades of recycling the very same, disposable, one-dimensional, ‘musical’ concepts becomes too much even for ‘the zombie’.

New generations of musically educated and gifted Bosnians are starting new movements as an antidote to over-saturation of meaningless Turbo Folk.

Sons and grandsons of Sevdalinka performers from decades ago are starting their own movements and are bringing back to life their own interpretations of Sevdalinkas, while enjoying significant following in the process.

Sevdalinka is coming back as a healing to the cultural and spiritual wounds of Bosnians (and Serbians), who now increasingly want to simply relax and enjoy the simple and highly effective sound and message of this wonderful traditional Bosnian song, which has over centuries filled hearts of Balkan peoples with peace, love, happiness and melancholy

Summary

Bosnia is a land of great and unique cultural heritage, which over the last century has been subject to extreme and systematic forms of cultural genocide.

Commercialised, ad-hoc, fusion styles of music have diminished the significance of Sevdalinka in the ears of every day listener.

Bosnia, however is now coming into a new cultural era, in which the regular person is sick and tired of recycled Turbo Folk rubbish and are coming back to appreciating the real beauties of Sevdalinka and real values of Sevdah heritage.

Original Bosnian lyrics

Na mezaru Šemsudina,
jedine moje ljubavi,
skrivala sam, tugovala,
sjećala se davnih dana.

Nabraću ja buket ruža,
u mom đulistanu,
da mi ruža mirom miri,
kao nekad na kapiji.

Al’ će doći sudnji danak,
pa i ja ću umrijeti.
Naše će se duše sresti
u Džennetu mirisnome.

English translation

At the grave of Šemsudin,
my only true love,
I was hiding, I was mourning,
I remembered those lovely days.

I will pick a rose bouquet
from my rose garden
so may the rose smell fragrantly
like once at our gate.

But the Judgement Day will come
and I will also die.
And our souls will meet
in the fragrant Paradise.

Original Bosnian lyrics

Pogledaj me, Anadolko,
Muhammeda ti.
Ja ću tebi sevdalinke
pjesme pjevati.

Hraniću te bademima,
da mi mirišeš,
pojiću te đul-šerbetom,
da mi sevdišeš.

Ruse kose, curo imaš,
žališ li ih ti?
Aman, da ih žalim,
ne bih ti ih dala
da ih mrsiš ti.

Crne oči, curo imaš,
žališ li ih ti?
Aman, da ih žalim,
ne bih ti ih dala
da ih gledaš ti.

Medna usta, curo imaš,
žališ li ih ti?
Aman, da ih žalim,
ne bih ti ih dala
da ih ljubiš ti.

Rosom ću te umivati,
cvijete ubavi,
a u svilu zavijati,
moja ljubavi.

English translation

Look at me, Anatolian girl,
by Propeth Muhammad,
I will sing Sevdalinkas
to you.

I’ll feed you almonds,
so that you smell sweetly,
I’ll give you sherbet to drink,
so that you love me.

Your hair is red, my girl.
Do you pity it?
Alas, if I pitied it, I wouldn’t
let you caress it.

Your eyes are dark, my girl.
Do you pity them?
Alas, if I pitied them, I wouldn’t
let you look at them.

Sweet as honey are your lips, my girl.
Do you pity them?
Alas, if I pitied them, I wouldn’t
let you kiss them.

I’ll wash your face with dew,
my pretty flower,
I’ll wrap you in silk, my love.