Balkan Youth Come Together at the Mega Rock Summer School in Macedonia

From August 26 to September 2, 80 young people from Bosnia and Herzegovina, Macedonia, and Kosovo will come together in Skopje, Macedonia’s capital, for the annual Mega Rock Summer School. What started as an attempt to bring together youth from different ethnic groups in the city of Mitrovica, Kosovo, has now expanded to include youth from other divided communities in former Yugoslavia.

Back in 2008, Musicians without Borders, initiated the first rock summer school in Skopje in order to give the youth of Mitrovica a chance to socialize, play, and perform together outside of their divided city. Mitrovica, a city/municipality in the newly created state of Kosovo (which used to be part of Serbia until 2008), is de facto divided between the Albanian majority south and the Serbian majority north and has been a hotspot for ethnic conflict over the years. Similarly, the city of Mostar in Bosnia and Herzegovina has been divided ever since the war in the 1990s between the Bosniak east and the Croat west. Struga (Macedonia) has been making headlines for the increasing ethnic tension and violence between Albanians and Macedonians.

Under the motto “It’s all about the music,” these young people will have the opportunity to learn about what it means to be in a band, about song writing and recording, and most importantly about each other. Master classes, trainings, and workshops on the aspects of pop and rock music are also scheduled and will be led by the Dutch Fontys Rock Academy. The youth will work together in mixed bands for the chance to show off their hard work and talents at a major outdoor, 7-hour-long concert that will be held during the last day of summer camp in Skopje’s city park.

Creative Commons Love: Bridget Christian on Flickr.com

Written by Aldina Dzebo