The borderlands between Serbia, Montenegro, Kosovo and Albania, a crossroads between the\u00a0Slav and Albanian-speaking areas, is the heart of the Balkan peninsula and home to one of the\u00a0most celebrated epic song traditions, previously studied in the 1930s by Parry and Lord, who\u00a0adopted a radical new approach to the study of both written and oral epic narrative.\u00a0Promoted by the Intercultural Institute of Comparative Music Studies, this seminar and concert\u00a0will focus on the tradition of epic singing which, through various developments, including the\u00a0complex historical events in the area, still lives on today. One of the main groups of songs in\u00a0the Albanian language in this tradition is found in the Rugova Mountains in Kosovo, on the
\nborder with Montenegro. The greatest living performer of them, the singer Isa Elezi Lekgjekaj
\n(born 1947), has been specially invited to Venice for the occasion.
\nThe introductory seminar will be attended by the curators of the Harvard University Milman\u00a0Parry Collection and Zymer Ujkan Neziri from the Institute of Albanian Studies, Pri\u0161tina, the\u00a0author of several books that have helped to preserve these songs in writing. The concert will\u00a0include a complete performance of the Song of Halil\u2019s Wedding with Italian subtitles. Accompanying\u00a0Isa Elezi Lekgjekaj during the concert, two musicians playing \u00e7iflteli and sharki (long-necked\u00a0plucked lutes) will perform some instrumental pieces. The event will provide the occasion for the\u00a0presentation of a project by Nicola Scaldaferri concerning the publication of the Albanian epic\u00a0songs in the Milman Parry Collection, which have remained unpublished for over eighty years.<\/p>\n