Boris Kovac

ARTISTS

Boris Kovac

Boris Kovac (by Dejan Duragic)
  • country:Serbia
  • region:Gypsy and Balkan
  • style(s):
    • Balkan
    • Jazz
  • label:Piranha Records
  • type: Band, Solist, Composer/Songwriter
  • gender:male
  • instrumentation:instrumental, vocal

Oh – if love was but a carefree pleasure! Boris Kovac realised he could not run away from his beloved home of Vojvowhich, Serbia: even when he left for Canada, he went back and in made his artistic bonds even stronger, helped by the tying power of the soil, the diverse roots of the multicultural local people, living together in peace and harmony, and everything else that makes up the deep, heavy Balkan soul



There are two perspectives from which you may want to throw a glance when approaching Boris Kovac’s colourful works, which he describes in his own words. One – the emotional state of being that the average people of the Vojvodina build their lives upon: “Ever since my youth I have been aware that the only firm ground on which that culture bases itself is the delicate texture of the small-town and rural spirit of a man who is, in reality as well as in a metaphysical manner, bound to the soil and to its harvest, a man not easily moved around, not very communicative, a man mostly untouched either by the historical principle of modernity or various fundamental categories of the Western-type middle-class culture.”

Two – the multi-ethnicity of the Pannonian Basin that Vojvodina is a distinct part of: “Our advantage is that people from 20 different nationalities live together in the Pannonian plains. So today no-one can say which folklore my music stems from exactly. Me and my musicians – living in an urban situation, having no contact to the little villages in the country – we cannot retrace where the music comes from. It is anyway not necessary, I think. The crucial point is to use the sources as nourishment for your own creativity.”

As for the latter, Boris Kovac, composer, singer and sax player from Novi Sad, Serbia and born in 1955, has managed to do so perfectly. His activities so far include being a composer for theatre and film, director of the Ritual Nova Ensemble of multi-media artists, leader of the Ogledalo Music Theatre company and the Academy of Fine Skills, creator of “La Danza Apocalypsa Balcanica” with the LaDaABa Orchest and founder of La Campanella Orchestra.

On top of it all, he works with students to pass on his poetic view – another expression of the same feeling of responsibility that led him to return to his homeland after having lived in Italy, Slovenia, Austria and Canada during the early 1990s. Having learnt that he does not easily move himself around, he kept to working the soil he sprang from, harvesting what he is able to grow there in all its plentiful variety: the deeply spiritual cycles he writes for his ensemble Ritual Nova, the more formal contemporary chamber music for dance and theatre, and the dance music of his LaDaABa Orchest.

Quotes

"Kovac slips easily across that twilight zone where contemporary composition and folk music touch."

Chris Cutler, London

Contacts

Management

Boris Kovac
eMail: boriskovac@inbox.com
www.boriskovac.net
Tel: +381 (0)21 826 018

Booking

Hungary
Laszlo Horvath/X Produkcio
eMail: folkeuro@axelero.hu

Scandinavia
Ken Day
D Tours
eMail: kenday@dtours.org

UK
Musicians Incorporated
Jason Walsh
eMail: jason@musiciansincorporated.com

Line up

  • Bogdan Rankovic (clarinet, bass clarinet)
  • Boris Kovac (alto & soprano sax, voice)
  • Goran Penic (accordion)
  • Istvan Cik  (drums, percussion )
  • Milos Matic (double bass, tamburitza)
  • Olah Vince (acoustic guitars)
  • Vukasin Miskovic (classical guitar)

Links

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