Music

During the siege, the continuation of normal life in the city, continuation of creativity, for all citizens of Sarajevo was as important as bread or medicine or water.

This segment in FAMA research period 1992-1996 contains the question "Could you describe a creation of yours?" and interviewees' answers. Sarajevans (in this case: interviewees) created and accepted this model in order to survive: "We were all innovators of our own methods of survival" – as put by one of the respondents.

Sources: FAMA Collection 1992-1996: Oral History, Survival Questionnaire, Sarajevo Life Magazine, archival video and photo collection.

FLAMENCO

© FAMA Collection - Visual Archives 1992-1996 (Željko Puljić)

Dragana Ilić, singer, put on a dress from the National Theater collection, put make-up on, stepped on the stage and sang to a frozen, hungry and thirsty audience for whom this visit was more important than anything else. Face to face with the audience which was in the same danger when coming to a concert or a show and when leaving to go home. ‘We all lived like prisoners, singer and actors who had come to play music, sing or act in a play, and the audience alike’. All of them played together the Sarajevo Roulette, the Danse Macabre, that dance of death.

THE HARE KRISHNA CONCERT

FAMA Collection - Visual Archives 1992-1996

Hare Krishna band, performed a concert: people were dying of starvation, it was a tough year. They prepared some food in their temple, prepared a concert and invited people to come. They started tearing when they saw how happy people were to join them. All of them smiling, everyone clapped with joy. They told later that for a moment they forgot where they were: 'I thought I was somewhere else.'

A ROCK BAND

FAMA Collection - Visual Archives 1992-1996

Bure, leader of rock group Sikter: There was about 50-60 musicians to open a small studio in the TV building, which was safe from hits. They all worked together, they sang to each other asking for each other's opinion, which only a couple of years ago would have been unimaginable, because of vanity and plagiarism. It was a huge production of new songs. ‘My advice for mental health: enjoy everything and never look behind’.

DRUMMER

© FAMA Collection - Visual Archives 1992-1996 (Jelena Oksenfeld)

'I used to make hard hitting drum sounds, trying to be louder than the noise of demolishing the city. No one has ever complained.'

TANGO

© FAMA Collection - Visual Archives 1992-1996 (Jelena Oksenfeld)

Sabahudin Kurt, singer: 'I tried to get people out of shelters and basements, and get them to dance; to dance while shells were falling all around... and I realized the idea. People accepted it and they danced. It was the first tango in Sarajevo under siege.'

SAXOPHONE

© FAMA Collection - Visual Archives 1992-1996 (Jelena Oksenfeld)

'I played sax in my free time. Just the two of us in the room.'