11.3.2012, Menza pri koritu, Metelkova mesto
Serbian Cultural Center „Danilo Kis“ in cooperation with the Festival „Red Dawn“
HOSTING DAMIR IMAMOVIC
Concert: Damir Imamovic
In his solo performances Damir Imamovic offers a personal and intimate look at the history of sevdah, that is, he includes a personal reinterpretation of this traditional musical genre from Bosnia and Herzegovina. Through a profound processing of the history of sevdah, Damir Imamovic by subverting the genre turns to the present instead of the past and to seeking new expressive possibilities, where he goes beyond mere interpretation. His performances are not only a matter of acoustics, but also of reinterpretation of the cultural and social context of musical values which are loyal to tradition.
Guitarist and singer of sevdalinkas, Damir Imamovic (1978) has already introduced himself in Slovenia more than once with his Damir Imamovic Trio. After studying philosophy, he devoted himself to music, and, above all, to sevdah, as well as to numerous performances at home and across Europe.
12.3.2012, ISH, Faculty of Postgraduate Studies of Humanities, Knafelj`s passage 11
Serbian Cultural Center „Danilo Kis“ in cooperation with ISH, Faculty of Postgraduate Studies of Humanities
Sevdah Lab: Damir Imamovic
Damir Imamovic is a performer, a researcher and a collector of music and performing of sevdah, as an anthropological and cultural phenomenon of Bosnia and Herzegovina. The lecture and the discussion on the ISH were a challenge for students and researchers at ISH as it was a direct communication.
Sevdah is one of those Turkish words which have become domesticated in all Balkan languages and whose meaning is so specific that they actually cannot be translated; it is only possible to note differences in the nuances of their meaning from language to language. These words are already so domesticated that they actually take the label “Balkan” and mean exactly that what differs Balkan culture from the others. For example, those are words such as “inat“ (malice), “ćef“ (whim), “merak“, “dert“ and, of course, “sevdah“. The untranslatability of these words, which are mostly related to the state of mind and behavior that are associated with the Balkan culture, gives the Balkan languages color, common cultural memory and unchangeable elements of identity that is beyond national fabrications and prescribed terms.
Studies of Damir Imamovic show that in sevdalinkas patriarchal stereotypes about gender and social hierarchy are not fixed and that perhaps that desired sentiment was false. On the border between critical reading and enjoying the authentic, a whole new world of subversion and irony opens.
