This year again Sevdah was invited to participate at the TURKFEST 2005. This was the fifth Turkish festival in Seattle. The audience was very amazed by the Sevdahites, the little ones, as well as the big ones. We performed several of our favorite dances and our saz player, Nihad Djozić, entertained the audience with a set of Bosnian sevdalinka songs. Besides Sevdah, Behar, the other Bosnian Ensemble from Seattle, also participated at the festival as well as many other performers from the countries neighboring Turkey. Thus, one could have also seen some Kurdish, Iranian, Arab, and Central Asian dances. All these ethnic groups live in Turkey as well. It was a real pleasure to observe the colorful folk costumes from different regions of the Ottoman empire and perceive their similarities. Sevdah also had something to offer in this regard, too. The audience noticed and whole-heartedly praised our girls and their dresses (anterias.) Here is the first album of pictures from the Turkfest 2005 taken by Mili Mulić.


Here is another album of pictures from the Turkfest 2005. These pictures were taken by the professional photographer, Mr. Bryan Dazey. You can view and purchase these pictures also at Bryan's website. Sevdah thanks Bryan for letting us use his pictures on our website.

The Russian Cultural Center of Seattle, WA invited this year Sevdah to present the Bosnian-Herzegovinan folk dances at this year's Russian Bazaar. Sevdah performed at the Bazaar on Saturday (11/19), as well as on Sunday (11/20). Both performances lasted about one hour. In addition to the B-H city dances, for the enchanted Russian audience on Saturday Sevdah also demonstrated the B-H city folk costumes. Of course, Sevdah's children also participated in the program with B-H children songs: Imam janje maleno (I have a baby lamb), Lije pljusak (Rain is pouring), Ja se uspeh na tarabu (I climbed the fence), as well as with two folk dances. The audience enjoyed looking for similarities between the Bosnian and Russian languages and of course they found many. Both languages are Slavic languages. Our master of ceremonies, Svetlana Ramović, made our program even more accessible to the audience by leading it in Russian. The pictures from this Sevdah's performance can be found here.

On Sunday (11/20) we performed a somewhat different program for our Russian friends. Thus, instead of the folk costumes fashion show, we introduced to our audience a few sevdalinkas performed in the classical style, i.e. accompanied by saz. Of course, the songs were played and sung by our saz player, Nihad Djozić. The youth danced seven dances. We amused ourselves quite a lot, as well as our audience. The Bazaar was very rich in every sense, especially tables, which were full of delicious Russian national dishes. By this opportunity, we would like to thank Mr. Vladimir Kirsanov for his cordial hospitality and the Board of Directors of the Seattle's Russian Cultural Center for inviting us to the Bazaar. Спасибо! Pictures from this performance by Sevdah can be found here.

This year, the Ramadan Bayram fell on the beginning of November. However, due to some technical reasons, the Islamic Community of Bosniaks of the Washington State (ICBWA) organized the celebration of this Muslim holiday on November 26. It was also an opportunity to mark November 25, the Day of the Bosnian-Herzegovinan Statehood celebrated since 1943. Sevdah gladly accepted to participate in the celebration of these two holidays. As a gift for our loyal audience, and especially for our grandmas and grandpas, we prepared a special program. Sevdah's children started the performance with a comic dance interpretation of the song Burek (Meat Pie) by Dino Merlin, a Bosnian pop-rock star. After our children, Sevdah's youth performed a set of Bosniak city dances entitled the Himzo Polovina Sevdah And Dance Suite. Within this suite, Sevdah performed for the first time its Ibrik and Čaršijsko dances. (For more details about these and other dances, please, check our repertoire.) We continued with the Oklada and Karanfil dances, and our dear Anteria. The audience fell in love with our water ewers. Pictures from this performance are coming soon.

On November 27, 2005 Sevdah represented Bosnia and Herzegovina at the 6th Annual Winter Worldfest in Seattle. This folklore festival is traditionally organized by the Ethnic Heritage Council and Seattle Center. During these three days of the Festival the audience traveled the world - from Japan to Africa, from Croatia to Thailand, and from Brazil to Bosnia. At this Festival our children performed the Jajačka truska and Anteria dances. After them, our teenagers enchanted the audience with the Himzo Polovina Sevdah And Dance Suite. How much the audience liked our stage appearance is clear from the following statement by a lady who watched us, "Even if you did not dance so beautifully and if these lovely girls just stood on the stage, it would still be a pleasure to watch them in these beautiful garments and with these beautiful water ewers." Pictures from this performance can be found here. These pictures can also be seen and purchased at the website of their author, Mr. Bryan Dazey. Sevdah thanks Bryan for letting us use his pictures on our website.

On December 09, 2005 the B-H Folklore Ensemble BEHAR of Seattle, WA organized a concert of the Bosnian folk singer, Zehra Bajraktarević. Sevdah was kindly invited to perform at this concert. Thanks Behar for inviting us. On the request of our audience who followed us to Zehra's concert, we performed once again the Himzo Polovina Sevdah And Dance Suite of Bosniak city dances. Thus, besides the dancing of Sevdah's young women and men, the audience also had a chance to enjoy Himzo's traditional performances of sevdalinke (love songs): Mila majko, šalji me na vodu (Dear mother, send me to the water), Jutros prodjoh kroz čaršiju (This morning I passed through the market place), Okladi se momče i djevojče (A young man and woman had a bet), as well as Karanfile, cvijeće moje (Carnation, my dear flower.) From 11/19 to 12/09, i.e. within three weeks, Sevdah had five performances that would be more than enough even for a professional ensemble. Filled with the after-sweet tiredness of performing, we decided to close our successful performance year 2005 with this show at Zehra's concert. We had 14 performances in 2005. That is quite a nice number. Here are some pictures from this performance as a document in time for a long-lasting memory.