Nikola Borota’s Kameni cvijet (Stone Flower) and Inscriptions on Stećak Tombstones: Semantic and Poetic Level

Abstract

Themes of art in stone and the symbolism of the stone itself are actualized in the sphere of poetry, fine arts and art music in the SFR Yugoslavia in the second half of the 20th century, on the one hand probably under the influence of increased interest in these topics in the USSR, just before and after the World War Two, and, on the other hand, as a result of scientific and artistic fascination with medieval tombstones, stećci (predominantly from the territory of Herzegovina and Bosnia). General themes of stone, with the symbolic of eternal life and virtue, the resistance of transience and oblivion, the overcoming of death, left also a trace in the pieces of popular music of that era (the early Yugoslav representatives of the world music genre).

The ballade "Stone Flower", by the Sarajevo composer and producer Nikola Borota, is based on the South Slavic folk music templates, and on the arrangement and production principles of the British art rock band Procol Harum. This composition in its structural components: musical metric, melody, versification of lines, rhythms, text treatment, accent schedules, musical form and way of interpretation, contains certain particularities that justify the connection of this musical structure and its poetics with semantics and poetics of textual inscriptions on stećci. The analysis of the musical-structural components of the composition justifies the listening impression and experience, related to the experience when observing and reading the inscriptions on these stone monuments.