THE ALBANIAN MUSIC EXPERIMENT (Slovenia, Croatia)

Alma Bejtullahu, vocals
Vasko Atanasovski, saxophone
Zoran Majstorović, guitar

A premiere presentation of innovatively and playfully processed Albanian musical tradition interpreted by the eclectic trio.

Musicians Alma Bejtullahu, Vasko Atanasovski, and Zoran Majstorović are joining together their individual experiences to explore the music expression of Albanian traditional and popular music. They will engage with complex rhythms, modes, polyphony and ideas to offer the audience a unique sonic encounter.

Alma Bejtullahu, ethnomusicologist and singer, began singing and songwriting at an early age, receiving several music awards, including Fedemus and the Golden Ocarine. She has extensive experience in Albanian and Georgian traditional singing and has collaborated with various multipart vocal ensembles. Her artistic practice is closely intertwined with her ethnomusicological research: drawing on traditional musical material encountered through her fieldwork and scholarly work, she brings it into new performative contexts and collaborations with musicians from diverse musical and cultural backgrounds.

Saxophonist, flutist, and composer Vasko Atanasovski is one of Slovenia’s most creative and versatile musicians, renowned for his cross-genre collaborations and his distinctive approach to a wide range of musical idioms. His artistic work moves freely between jazz, rock, classical, traditional, and contemporary music, and has brought him together with internationally acclaimed musicians from across these fields. He has released thirteen critically acclaimed albums, while his performances and compositions have received widespread recognition from audiences and critics both in Slovenia and abroad. A regular presence on European festival and concert stages, he has also performed in India, China, Latin America, and New York. His compositional output extends beyond the concert stage to theatre, dance, and puppet productions, while his works have also entered the repertoires of distinguished soloists, orchestras, ensembles, and choirs.

Zoran Majstorović is an award-winning guitarist, multi-instrumentalist, composer, arranger, and sound artist who has been performing professionally since the age of thirteen. He completed his Master’s degree in Jazz Performance with highest honours at the Jazz Department of the Giuseppe Tartini Conservatory in Trieste, Italy. In addition to the guitar, he performs on an exceptionally broad range of string instruments from different musical traditions, including the oud, saz, pipa, charango, cindra, kora, mandolin, sitar, tamburitza, rubab, bouzouki, cigar box guitar, and ukulele. As an arranger, he is particularly active in the fields of jazz and world music, writing arrangements for numerous renowned ensembles and orchestras. His achievements have earned him several major Croatian music awards, including multiple Porin Awards, as well as the Damir Dičić Award for Best Croatian Jazz Guitarist, the Status Award for Best Croatian Ethno Instrumentalist, and the Miroslav Sedak Benčić Award for Best Croatian Jazz Composer.