The Federal Minister of Culture and Sports, Sanja Vlaisavljević, officially opened the 30th Sarajevo Nights of Music (30th SVEM 2024) in the National Theatreof Sarajevo.
On that occasion, Minister Vlaisavljević emphasised the importance of this renowned festival not only for Sarajevo, but also for Bosnia and Herzegovina and for the whole region.
In the text below you can read Minister Vlaisavljević’s speech:
– Bach once said that “music is a pleasant harmony in God’s honour and the permitted pleasures for the soul”. It was with Bach that the RTVSA Music Production started in 1972, at the initiative of Radivoje Spasić, the magic called the “Sarajevo Nights of Music”. That magic of music lasted in the musical reality of Sarajevo until 1990. Alojz Benac said in 1973 that the “Sarajevo Nights of Music” were creating the tradition of a manifestation in Sarajevo and Bosnia and Herzegovina that should become permanent. Sarajevo will no longer be without its Nights of Music. And the Ljubljana conductor Anton Nanut added, “as this Festival is on the way to become highly appreciated, I think that over time it should spread beyond the borders of our country, so that individual soloists would also be the world names in the musical reproductive art”. And so it was! Then, there occurred a two-year break between 1986 and 1989.
– After twenty-two years of silence, Ninoslav Verber decided to breathe life into the Nights of Music that had brought musicians together decades before.
Music is always grounded in rhythm. Music, at least Orff’s music, is never music alone. It is related to movement, dance and speech, or as Orff himself says, it is a form of music that requires one’s participation, not as a listener but as a co-performer. May the 30th anniversary of the Festival be opened with Orff’s vision of a meeting of composers, musicians, and listeners as a community that together creates a magical evening of the sublime! May Verber’s magical power continue stronger until the next jubilee. – Minister Vlaisavljević said.
The 30th jubilee of the “Sarajevo Nights of Music” was opened with the cantata Carmina Burana by Carl Orff, performed by the Sarajevo Philharmonic, the Sarajevo National Theatre Opera Choir, the Festival Choir Virtuosi and the Superar Children’s Choir and vocal soloists: Nina Dominiko (soprano), Ileš Bečeij (countertenor) and Domeno Križaj (baritone), conducted by the respected conductor Ivo Lipanović.
The official opening of SVEM was attended by Minister Vlaisavljević’s Advisor Damir Bunoza and Assistant Minister for Culture, Mirela Milićević Šečić.
