After an adolescence sheltering from the siege of Sarajevo in the Bosnian war, Damir Imamović dedicated his musical life to researching, performing and making accessible the sevdalinka (AKA sevdah) of his childhood. These emotional southern Slavic songs of loss, love and longing find a fascinating new home on his eighth album. Written as a companion piece to his friend Aleksandar Hemon’s novel of the same name, it amplifies the story of two male Bosnian soldiers, one Muslim, one Jewish, who fall in love during the first world war.
Imamović combines sevdalinka with Sephardic Jewish songs and intricately written originals to reflect how these characters sing to each other. Centuries-old ballads crackle with urgent emotions. In the 15th-century Anderleto, Imamović’s playing of his Persian lute, pressing and tingling, frames a tale of adultery in a magical balance of beauty and dread.
