VLADIMIR

When thinking about the Balkans, the Jewish are rarely the first of its peoples to come to mind. Indeed, they were so absent from the thinking of those who drew up the post-war constitution that they, along with the Roma, were inadvertently excluded from occupying the highest offices of state in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Yet they have had a long cultural presence in the peninsula, with the Lira Jewish Choral Society flourishing in Sarajevo until World War II. This musical legacy is fragmentary these days, and Bosnian singer Vladimir Mićković and his companions have ranged far afield to hunt down their material. In the process they have drawn on the urban music of Bosnia itself, with familiar tunes emerging in new guises – the melody used in ‘El Dio Alto’, perhaps originally Jewish, perhaps originally Muslim, is instantly recognisable. The presence of the Mediterranean, and specifically its Italian currents, is also clearly audible in these arrangements. Mićković’s voice is high in register, almost in counter-tenor range. It might be an acquired taste, but its rich timbre and his flexible phrasing lend the songs a sepia-toned, warmly romantic charm.