A Judith Green Kind of Week

Jadranka Stojakovic

Among other calamatous events in March, my friend Judith Green died. She was only 54, still full of the flame and biting intelligence that got her in trouble professionally over and over in the past few years. I still can't believe she's gone. And I never fail to think of her whenever the curtain goes up on a show or concert or opera. She was a wonderful music critic who could write about notes and dance steps using concrete images and who felt that the music beat included symphony politics and budget-fighting.

She ignited my grown-up love for opera taking me to a Madama Butterfly in Baltimore some years back. We sat with a box of kleenex between us.

Judith sang in two choirs, rewrote liturigal music, wrote reviews of ballets, operas and symphonies and just hung out at shows. Over the course of a week she'd see a dozen productions, one a night, matinees and more on weekends.

I felt a bit like her this week after taking in "Third Tenor" Jose Carreras Monday night and then last night catching Jadranka Stojakovic -- old Yugoslavia's answer to Joan Baez. Sarajevo is so cultural.

I didn't like the Carreras show. He did all German and Spanish songs and stood so close to the microphone that his powerful voice didn't so much thrill as bore a hole in my head.The Symphonic Orchestra of Croatian Radio Television was excellent with Strauss and Albioni, but it was not what I'd come for.

Up until nearly the end of the show my favorite part was the intermission. I went outside with Mirsad who wanted a smoke. Well, so did 98 percent of the audience which filled the old Olympic stadium. A cloud of smoke encircled the patio outside the theater doors. Dozens of well-dressed people puffed furiously and there was no air. We could have been inside those glass cages they set up in airports for smokers rather than outside.

But then at the encore, an amazing thing happened: Carreras and the Albania soprana performing with him, Inva Mula, switched to Italian opera. They did five arias all Puccini and Verdi. It was great and lovely. Why, we wondered, hadn't they done a whole show of this and tacked on five loud songs at the end!

We almost didn't get in to see Jadranka. With excellent forethought, concert organizers put this widely popular singer giving a free concert in a tiny room in the Dom Armija (Army House). They set up a 6-foot screen atop the Dom so people could watch in the square, but by 8:40 there wasn't a plastic chair to be had.

Dona and Miranda and I pressed against the doors trying to get in, along with hundreds more. This was the closest to sex I've come in months. We all pressed forward while a few big guys bossily held us at bay while letting in a few very select people.

Some were from embassies, some carried tripods or other equipment, which is what I'm now bringing to all Bosnian concerts in order to insure I get a good seat. I felt like those crowds that used to stand outside the Club 54 disco in NYC hoping to catch the eye of the doorman to get in. A well-dressed man behind us in the crush muttered, "Typical Bosnian event, so well organized."

I would have settled for standing in the square but Dona is amazing. She pushed to the door jamb yelling -- "She's an American. From America. We have to get in!"

I noticed that a lot of people getting in waved pieces of paper. I asked if invitations had gone out -- no. So what was the paper then? Apparently anything that looked official would work. I contemplated the Nordstrom's credit card in my wallet, a Florida driver's license. A couple breezed by and in his hand was -- a press card.

Well, we got in and the concert was great. The lead group, the Damir Imamovic Trio, of guitar, bass fiddle and violin played old Bosnian folk tunes which I really liked, but Jadranka was the star.

I ended up leaving this concert early-- during a long solo by a Japanese artist Jadranka brought with her. I like lots of music but not atonal, high-pitched wailing.

As I walked across the square, the 6-foot-high screen blasting away the music I was trying to escape and I was struck by the oddity of an American walking across the Bosnian capital to the tune of a Japanese string instrument serenade.