Balkan Blues

Sevdah, reconciliation, and the music of a divided city

Balkan Blues is a short music documentary directed by Lucio De Candia that travels to Mostar to explore how sevdah, the traditional Bosnian blues, became a vehicle for post-war healing and interethnic dialogue.

What Balkan Blues is about

At the heart of the film is Mostar Sevdah Reunion, a multicultural world music band founded after the end of the conflict in former Yugoslavia. The band's mission was twofold: to preserve and promote the sevdahlinka genre, a centuries-old tradition of melancholic Bosnian song rooted in longing and love, and to facilitate reconciliation among the region's divided ethnic communities. Producer and founder Dragi Šestić, alongside guitarists Miso Petrovic and Sandi Durakovic, emigrated to the Netherlands in the mid-1990s but return to Mostar every year to record albums and hold concerts. Through their testimonies and those of other local artists, the film traces the artistic and social tensions that still shape everyday life in the city, using music as a common language across cultural and religious divides.

Director and subjects

Lucio De Candia directs and edits the film, with original music provided by Mostar Sevdah Reunion themselves. The three central figures, Šestić, Petrovic, and Durakovic, serve both as subjects and as the documentary's musical backbone, their personal nostalgia for Mostar giving the film its emotional core. Other local artists from the city add further perspectives on what it means to create in a place still processing the aftermath of conflict.

Awards and festival selections

Balkan Blues won the Best Mid-Length Film award at FICNOVA, the International Film Festival of Active Nonviolence, recognising its demonstration of how music and art can open processes of reconciliation across religious and cultural divides. The film also travelled widely on the international festival circuit, receiving official selections at the Moscow European Film Festival, the South East European Film Festival, the Jecheon International Film and Music Festival, Festival del Cinema Europea, Babel Med Music, and Seefest.

Sevdah: the Balkan blues explained

Sevdahlinka, often called simply sevdah, is a traditional genre from Bosnia and Herzegovina with roots stretching back more than four centuries. Its melancholic character, centred on themes of longing, love, and loss, has frequently drawn comparisons to the blues and to fado. Mostar Sevdah Reunion became internationally recognised for updating and expanding the genre while keeping its emotional depth intact, making it a cultural bridge that speaks across linguistic and ethnic boundaries. This short documentary captures that spirit in direct, intimate form.

Where to watch Balkan Blues online

Balkan Blues is available to stream on GuideDoc, the documentary streaming platform. If you enjoy this film, GuideDoc also offers other music documentaries such as The Luthier, I don't sing just to sing, and Pepi Fandango.