By Tony Hillier
Given the turmoil and terror unleashed around him in recent weeks, Paris resident Goran Bregović provides unexpectedly rational and fulsome responses to probing from Rhythms in advance of his second Australian tour in two years.
But then, as one born and raised in Sarajevo – another beautiful European city that has experienced mayhem and murder in recent years – the voluble Serbian-Croatian bandleader, composer and guitarist is not exactly unaccustomed to troubled times.
While Bregović has performed in some of the world’s most hallowed concert halls, including the Sydney Opera House, to which he will be returning during his visit in February, two venues that he’s also played are closer to his mind at the moment, and with good reason. “One is a concert in The Bataclan in Paris, recently the scene of indescribable horror,” he conveys. “The other is a meadow in Dyarbakir – on the frontier between Turkey, Syria and Iraq, where we performed in front of 200,000 Kurds that came to listen to a local politician, whose speech was followed by our concert.”
On his last visit to our shores, Bregović led his 19-piece Weddings & Funerals Orchestra in a stupendous non-stop 90 minute set that brought WOMADelaide 2013 to a suitable climax. When he returns in the new year, he’ll have a much smaller ensemble in tow, comprising five brass players, two Bulgarian voices, lead vocal and drums and himself on guitar. But he insists it’ll be just as lively, if anything more so. “Concerts with the small band are more festive and dancey than the ones performed with the big orchestra.”
Bregović is proud of the fact that his personnel have barely changed over the years. “We are a stable pack,” he declares. “There is a core of three from the original band formed 20 years ago, most others have been with me for 15 years.” He says Muharem Redzepi, the outstanding Kosovo-born gypsy singer who leads the vocal section, has been with the band since 2011, though he advises he has a ‘new’ trumpet player, who joined them last year. The brass section also includes players of Roma origin.
Songs from the band’s last album, Champagne For Gypsies, will be on the upcoming Australian set-lists, Bregović assures, along with some new material that he’s about to release, plus some older favourites. “My new album, Three Letters From Sarajevo, is just about ready, but I’m now in the longest phase when you listen to the material recorded and are in the excruciating position of having to choose, cut, add and alter, so I’d prefer not to talk about it too much.”
For those unfamiliar with his music, Bregović blends raucous Balkan gypsy rock and tango with brassy wedding and funeral folk songs and European classicism to create a robust and richly entertaining mélange. Conceding that he has retained a “hedonistic streak” from his earlier days as punk rocker, the bandleader emphasises, “I must have fun when I play music – if I have fun playing the concert, then the audience enjoys it also. My favourite gig is the one that we are playing tonight. There is always the same excitement and deep pleasure and yet each concert is unique, like each face we meet.”
Bregović established his credentials as a bandleader in Bijelo Dugme, one of the most lauded rock bands in the history of the former Republic of Yugoslavia. Current comment suggests that his latest band is much superior. “When I was younger I believed that my music had to be wrapped in western dress, which so much impressed the youth in the communist countries of Eastern Europe. In the times of Bijelo Dugme, I worked with musicians who had to copy and imitate. Now I work with real, talented musicians who play music naturally.”
Being brought up in the former Yugoslavia the son of a Serbian mother and Croatian father has palpably influenced Bregović, who sees himself as a unifying agent, meshing musical, cultural and thematic ideas. As he explains, “Yugoslavia was a country made up of pieces that sometimes didn’t fit well together. My music is certainly Frankenstein-like also, because it’s under the influence of elements that elsewhere would be impossible to blend.”
Over the years, Bregović, who lives and works in Belgrade when he’s not in Paris, has undertaken a wide range of collaborations and projects. He’s currently engaged on several intriguing new projects, including a piece entitled ‘From Sarajevo’. “It’s written for a solo instrument, the violin, played in a Western, Oriental and Jewish way, uniting on the allegorical level, the three religions that constitute the biggest treasure and curse of Sarajevo. The irony of fate is that this piece will be premiered on June 14, 2016 at the St. Denis Festival – a few hundred meters from the stadium, where France just lived the same drama as Sarajevo.”
Bregović, who has collaborated with a diverse range of acts over the years, including Iggy Pop, Scott Walker, Cesária Evora, Ofra Haza and the Gipsy Kings, has found that it’s always easy to work with people of great talent. “Since I myself work with archetypes, I like to work with artists who in their way are archetypes. I lay my own archetype next to theirs and they live parallel lines, like strata in a fossil stone.”
He laments the fact that nowadays “most musicians” make music “sitting alone in front of a computer”. He insists that he still makes music the old-fashioned way. Bregović says he was born too late to have the opportunity to work on film scores in the time when it was still considered the greatest art of the 20th century, “when composers from Stravinsky to Phil Glass really made film music”. Today, he maintains, “film is only a product – and, like any product, all it needs is clichés. I can put three or four films into my biography, but today I have an intense feeling of losing time when I work for movies.”
Goran Bregović might be a brilliant bandleader and composer, but he certainly doesn’t overrate his ability as a player. “I’m unfortunately a very mediocre guitarist. I never dreamt that one day I would meet my idol, Eric Clapton. It happened a few years back in Belgrade. Someone on the phone said ‘Eric Clapton would like to speak to you…’ And he did! To invite me to his concert in Belgrade. Miracles happen!”
Goran Bregović and his band perform at the Sydney Opera House (Feb 16), Melbourne Arts Centre (Feb 18), Queensland Performing Arts Centre, Brisbane (Feb 19) and the Perth International Art Festival (Feb 21).
# Bregović Back On The Balkan Party Beat #