Against the backdrop of a Europe drifting apart, threatened by populism and war, seven composers from the seven republics that emerged from the former Yugoslavia artistically explore the effects of the Balkan wars – an experience that continues to resonate deeply within their societies today. Each of their works offers a highly personal and sensitive artistic response, opening up diverse perspectives on this turbulent era. Belonging to a younger generation, they themselves lived through the wars only as children, teenagers, or not at all. From their encounter with the voices and personalities of the Neue Vocalsolisten Stuttgart, seven performative works for voice and electronics have emerged.

The human voice – inseparably bound to body and individuality, capable of stirring emotions while simultaneously conveying textual meaning – becomes the central artistic challenge. A constructivist compositional approach breaks open to reveal a highly emotional, powerful, and at times brutal sonic landscape.

Themes ranging from serious and ironic retrospectives to future perspectives, from social reflections on the clash of religions and ethnicities, hyperinflation, physical and psychological violence serious and ironic retrospectives to future perspectives, from social reflections on the clash of religions and ethnicities, hyperinflation, physical and psychological violence, unfold into seven strikingly different concertante and music-dramatic works.

A walk-in video installation then opens up a polyphony of voices. In interviews conducted across their homelands – with family members, taxi drivers in Sarajevo, professors in Belgrade, a Ukrainian migrant in Montenegro – and with figures such as Kosovar theater-maker Jeton Neziraj, Slovenian lawyer Miša Zgonec-Rožej, and even an AI robot – the composers capture diverse perspectives on the fragile art of living together across national, ethnic, and religious divides.

Finally, in a coda, the composers return to the themes with a fresh lens. Whereas the concert part looked back on the explosive years of the 1990s, these short musical pieces reach forward – tentative glimpses into an uncertain future suspended between disillusionment and hope.