Before the usual, densely packed concert offer at the end of the year, it is not bad to remind that many fill the halls, but an additional, qualitative connection between a performer and his/her audience in the same space is rarely established, especially when it is not about serial programs from evening to evening -evening. Although during the long renovation of the Sava Center (SC), Amira Medunjanin even had a hat-trick three years ago in the hall of the House of Unions (under changing names/sponsors), her return to the Blue Hall of SC was awaited, where she has so far held five triumphant performances. Last Saturday, in front of more than 4.000 visitors (tickets 2.500 - 4.500 dinars), it was even better, as if "Evenings of Sevdah" and "Indexes and Friends" had also poured in, which had lost momentum here in previous seasons; the audience was significantly younger, instead of cranes with cameras, a drone flew over us, even one was seen with pumped up lips, and the new management changed some of the main entrances to SC, so we had to rush around the entire building.
As soon as Amira started My darling Kemal Monten, it was perfected to walk gracefully along that thin wire that underlines the lowest common denominator of all our souls; in every kind of music he will find sevdah, his probe with which he (examines) us from the inside. To that extent, the best English label for her work would be "Balkan Soul", although "Bosnian Billie Holiday" (by Garth Cartwright, esteemed colleague) is persistently repeated here. Who doesn't know better globally/from the outside, let him, but Mrs. Medunjanin - let's be local - is the golden intersection of Bebe Selimović's impeccable stylization and Jadranka Stojaković's intuitive innovation. Maybe it wasn't obvious in the first hour through the traditional sevdalinka Snow fell on the behar, on fruit i Two young people loved each other (Yellow quinces), or in the "makedo-bloc" when she included acapella Macedonia of the Time group. For connoisseurs of pianist Bojan Zulfikarpašić's opus - "Zemunca from France" - it was a treat A pine branch, which he had for a long time in his jazz repertoire.
Since almost every time he visits Belgrade with a different/up-to-date accompaniment ("Vreme" 1263, 1354), Amir was now played by old collaborators Bojan Z. (slightly prepared piano) and Boško Jović (classical/acoustic guitar), often using their instruments and as percussive; the bass guitarist is Mario Rašić, and two much younger, virtuoso instrumentalists - Antonio Vrbički (piano accordion) and Leopold Stašić (violin) - added originality. The almost apothecary-like precision and measuredness of these five, their interrelationship, unexpected sound colors and interludes where it is sometimes difficult to untangle which part is which (especially thanks to the bass buttons under Vrbički's fingers), make them probably the best line-up we have heard with Ms. Medunjanin. And much wider.
In the standard part of the concert, the background projections were based on natural elements – air/wind, clouds; water/waves, rivers, snowflakes; trees, birds etc – totally in tune with the force of nature/surge of emotion in Amira's interpretations. While she smoothly and fully presented the just released album Homeland (publisher for Serbia, Long Play), on the big screen behind her, however, mainly black and white illustrations, animations and video clips related to the cover of this extraordinary realization alternated. (If I correctly understood the accompanying text by Miljenko Jergović, the songs belong (and) to those who perform them best). Although during her more than 20-year career, Amira Medunjanin was accepted as a first-class interpreter of Balkan traditional songs, Homeland is mostly Sevdalian, but - watch out now - composed of new original tracks! It was beautifully produced by Bojan Z. and Amira, and it opens I build bridges with song Damir Imamović (text by journalist etc. Ahmed Burić...I fell a hundred times/She saw everything from below), which seems to continue on We will sing what our heart knows which Damir, the grandson of Zaim Imamović, one of the defining sevdah singers, now the leader of neo-sevdah, also wrote for her. They also repeated the wonderful ones Vein Boško Jovića (text by Marija Karaula Krznarić), title of Amira's album from 2016 (Long Play), with which she started to introduce her contemporary authors.
Jović did not play on Homeland not even in this part of the concert, and the accompanying quartet subordinated to Amira's ever-richer voice restrainedly paused every step, (o) breathing with the dynamics of the tango ensemble, not allowing emotions to overwhelm and drown it; maybe it's some kind of dance, for which we don't know the steps yet. However, the biggest/pleasant surprise are the new songs – Eh, yes i do (music by Vrbički, text by Medunjanin, in memory of his father - That I was a shooting star/To fulfill your wish), the soul Alma Abdagić, O, why Vrbicki, When you are the second – and a roll/inversion where they sound more traditional than most of her older recordings. Refined arrangements, mostly by Vrbicki and Amira herself, certainly contribute to that. Live, the violin and accordion solos almost drew the singer into improvisation, it is not excluded that we will hear more vocalizations/melisms from her.
The end of this album and concert block is ravishing, only covered with piano and violin Be there which, as well as When you are the second, written by Dino Šaran, longtime leader of the Sarajevo band Letu Stuke. Amira is an album For Him and Her (2020, Croatia Records) composed of covers of songs by Toma Z. and Silvana A, and me through Vein i Be there the vocal overtones echo the songs of Toma Zdravković from his last LP releases in his lifetime.
We remember how, before the breakup of the Sci-Fi Republic (Yugoslavia), BJ Štulić started digging a folk-tunnel to escape to peace; he could not have known that a couple of decades later, Amira Medunjanin would come from the opposite end. At the end of the concert, she performed an informal conference of real Sarajka From one to the other the almost forgotten Montenegrin singer-songwriter Miladin Šobić, confirming that it would be an honor if Amira wanted to cover his song. Likewise for Johnny, whose it is If you know anything finished the two and a half hour performance.
Standing ovations broke out on several occasions before, they were greeted by standing ovations. Despite everything we live in the midst of, after this concert we felt much better, inspired and encouraged. In translation for non-Balkans: those songs are our - and the world's - intangible treasure, and Amira keeps adding jewels and gold bars to it.
