despoina leviathan before or after thessa

In this article, I discuss the celebration’s musical representation of Macedonia as a composite of a range of ideological positions whose production processes allowed for the negotiation of cultural memory narratives involving history, ethnicity, and national identity. At these sites––rehearsal rooms, recording studios, and informal gatherings––the varied dispositions of participants in the celebration (e.g., musicians, dancers, producers, directors) towards ideas of the nation were more legible than they were on the seemingly unified stage of the highly mediated celebration. While the celebration may have seemed like a monolithic concretion of a particular representation of Macedonia, the production and preparation processes for the musical events of celebration provided myriad sites for the negotiation of this representation. With Macedonia having faced years of economic challenge, ethnic strife, and political struggle common to many ex-Yugoslav and postsocialist societies, the celebration of twenty years of independence provided Macedonians (in particular the government-appointed organizers) with an opportunity to represent themselves not only to the outside world, but also, and perhaps more importantly, to their fellow citizens.

The celebration was a spectacle of unprecedented proportions in Macedonia and featured the unveiling of the newly redesigned center square in Skopje, an hour-long speech by Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski, many musical performances, and an audience of Macedonians from all over the country. On September 8, 2011, the Republic of Macedonia celebrated the twentieth anniversary of its peaceful declaration of independence from Yugoslavia in 1991. By bringing together discourses on cultural memory, nationalism, and practice theory with an analysis of three musical performances from the celebration, I argue that in musical performance, individuals and groups who seemingly support the politically powerful can concurrently challenge (and perhaps shape) nationalist agendas, official expressions of identity, and aesthetic strategies for coping with external challenges to the legitimacy of their nation. Based on ethnographic fieldwork among composers, producers, performers, and audiences at several sites of the production of the twentieth anniversary celebration, this article analyzes both state cultural apparatuses and the seemingly contradictory practices of individuals enacting nationalistic cultural memory ideologies to which they do not necessarily subscribe.

The performances evoked both real and imagined pasts by intertwining musical elements of Macedonian folklore with those of European classical and contemporary popular musical traditions. Against the backdrop of numerous brand-new monuments to Macedonian heroes dating back to Alexander the Great, the event featured performances by the national philharmonic, opera chorus, ballet, and folk ensemble along with stars from various popular music genres. On September 8, 2011, the Republic of Macedonia commemorated twenty years of independence with an elaborate celebration in capital city Skopje’s newly redesigned center square.

Despoina leviathan before or after thessa