Music as a Force for Peace
July 2004
Banner photo: ©SEKAI BUNKA PHOTO
Azra: Linked by Music
"Music is the weapon," claimed the Nigerian musician Fela Kuti. Politicians in various parts of the world, aware of this fact, try to control music and musicians to avoid their potentially "negative" impact. The Chilean junta killed singer Victor Jara, and even certain musical instruments were considered a political threat decades ago, such as Andean Indian instruments in Chile or Turkish instruments in Bulgaria.
Civilizations of the past, as diverse as the Chinese, the Egyptian and the Greek, used music for the development of personality. Nowadays musicians often play an important role in communicating messages on social issues.
The Norwegian project Azra, which was shaped in 1994 for the betterment of the Bosnian refugee situation in Norway, is an example of music being used in conflict management.
"Bosnian cultural identity" refers to the identity of the ethnically, religiously and otherwise diverse population of Bosnia and Herzegovina, encompassing mainly the Bosniaks of Islamic heritage, the Serbs of Orthodox Christian heritage and the Croats of Roman Catholic heritage. At the time of Yugoslavia’s disintegration, people’s sense of ethnic identity became a target of intense political manipulation. The media were used to persuade people that they have more in common with their ethnic/national kinsmen, no matter how far away they live, than with their neighbors, and that coexistence was impossible.
The prewar balance between local/regional and ethnic affiliation with "acknowledgment of cultural diversity and coexistence as an intrinsic quality of life" was seriously challenged during the war in the 1990s.
Some 11,000 refugees from Bosnia and Herzegovina made up the largest refugee group in Norway in 1994, and they faced many social and psychological problems. The Azra project built on ethnomusicological and anthropological evidence of commonalities among the Bosnians to confront the propaganda that people claiming different ethno-religious affiliations can no longer live together. The project aimed to help the refugees while living in Norway, and also to prepare them for coexistence in multiethnic Bosnia and Herzegovina in the future.
Azra was rooted in three connected activities: research on the cultural--and specifically musical--identity of the refugees; education for Norwegians and Bosnians in Norway through Music in Exile and Ethnomusicology classes at the University of Oslo and bilingual lectures in refugee centers; and music making within the Azra ensemble. Each of these three categories was integrated with and supportive of the other two.
After learning to perform some Bosnian music, the Norwegian students were introduced to Bosnian refugee musicians, and the musicians taught each other Norwegian and Bosnian tunes respectively. In the ensuing years the ensemble gave concerts in refugee camps all over Norway, performed at various public gatherings and received considerable media attention.
The intentions of Azra were: (1) To offer to all Bosnians, regardless of their ethno-religious affiliation, a musical concept with which they could associate, and (2) to focus public attention on Bosnia and Herzegovina.
In creating a truly Bosnian musical concept, it was important to note that musicians of all Bosnia’s ethnic groups "shared in the preservation, evolution, and affirmation" of rural secular music and of sevdalinka and other urban musical genres, considering them to be a kind of ecumenical urban Bosnian-Herzegovinian folk music, or simply "their" music. The repertoire and instrumentation of Azra reflected urban Bosnian culture. Carefully selected Bosnian songs, which used to be appreciated regardless of ethnic and religious labels, had a strong impact on the audiences.
Evaluation of the project indicated strengthening of the sense of Bosnian cultural identity among the refugees and both quantitative and qualitative increases in communication between the Bosnians and the Norwegians.
Sead Krnjic, singer in Azra, commented: "This is very important for our people from Bosnia and Herzegovina. While making music for them I feel . . . that we are opening again their souls and hearts . . . After all that pain they went through, I think that sevdah makes them alive again."
Svanibor Pettan is professor and chair of ethnomusicology in the Department of Musicology at the University of Ljubljana, Slovenia.
