Member Spotlight: Andrija Sagic (Belgrade Serbia)

Every two weeks, members of the network vote for one of the top 10 most active CPnetwork artists to be featured on the home page and interviewed for the blog. The current bi-monthly’s vote ends June 22 and we would like to introduce you to our most recent leader, Andrija Sagic (Belgrade Serbia).

Andrija Sagic is a Medieval musician and has participated in many festivals in Italy (San Gimignano, Florence, Ravenna, Gubbio, Gorizia) and many festivals in Serbia. His “Freak Out” Theater explores the point between Music, Poetry and Theater. He has also participated in “April’s Meeting” a festival of contemporary art in SKC (Belgrade, Serbia). He has played with “Ginger Ensemble” (Bern) in a concert of experimental and contemporary music. He specialized in recordings of acoustic concerts. He play many different instruments (recorders, baglama, pipe and tabor, tombak, darabuka, davoul, bendir, portative organ, psalterion, clarinet, piano, riqq).

Can you tell us a little about your history and your performative concerns.

I studied philosophy and specialized in authentic interpretation of Medieval music as an authentic “Joculatore”. My main perfomative concern is an auditive perception, through a pure sound of Pythagoras system, with Medieval and Contemporary instruments to create a unique experience in the listener. Every space have it’s own acoustic property, according to that I arrange different sources and place them in that space. Also, in the manner of Medieval theater I make thematic performances combining poetry, music and theater, now in pure acoustic

What projects are you working on now?

At the moment I prepare a celebration of World’s Day of Music (June 21st). “World’s day of Music. A Critical-Performance Spectacle” It’s consisted of a conference “What for, Music?” This conference is about actual perception of Music, it’s place in our culture and society. Philosophical and practical view about key questions about Music today. With participation: dr Smiljka Isakovic (harpsichord player, professor of Management in Music), dr Ivan Vukovic (professor of Philosophy of Culture and Kant’s philosophy), Andrija Sagic (moderator, practitioner and theoretician of Music) (*This conference will be recorded and let on Serbian National Radio station.) I am also working on multimedia musical spectacle “MUZIKA” (In the evening). The first part is created from the name “MUZIKA” where every letter belongs to one composer or music collection, in a chronological order (from now to Antique). The second part is focused on auditive perception initiated with contemporary and traditional instruments through a different auditive-space postulations. ( In three different space in the building)

What are the biggest performative obstacles for yourself in these works (either past or the one you are working on now)?

The biggest performative obstacles are the organization and technical arrangement of the space itself (lights, sound check, etc), mainly technical obstacles. But there is an atmospheric obstacle, to change it in a moment which is a matter of practice and a long preparation, actually the sound control your performance but in the same time you control a performance.

What was the last piece that you saw that you would recommend to the Network and why?

I would recommend the performance “Piano in the Forest”. It included the sounds of a forest ambient combined with a live piano playing. The main concept is dislocation from urban area to a human’s native area, which is the forest. To posit the human back in it’s natural place, IN the Nature, NOT ABOVE the Nature. This performance is with minimal light or in total dark (to isolate auditive perception, without visual).