Glastonbury, Coachella... Guča?!

I love music. Festival music is something else, you enter a portal into a fairy land where each stage transforms your world into whatever the band wants it to be. Where the lands you are shown on the wild ride are gothic, grungy, magical, stormy, and luscious with melodic flora and fauna of every variety. What makes you keep going back is your desire to be surprised and your willingness to leave your senses in the hands of the musicians and the surrender to the atmosphere. 

Still going strong after 53 years is Guča Trumpet Festival. Sure, this festival may have changed over the course of half a century - there's more acts, more stalls and whole lot more people, but at its heart and shooting out of every artery is unmistakably Serbian culture and tradition. 

Once a year, the tiny town of Guča (goo-cha), with the population of no more than two thousand people, swells into a puffy gypsy fish in a rendition of a Disney movie like no other. The fairy tale Serbian village sets the backdrop to a musical score of dizzying Balkan brass like you cannot imagine until you experience it yourself. During the course of the festival, the population inflates to over half a million kolo-ing party people in the space of seven days. Erupting into an overflowing of merriness fuelled by meat, music and copious amounts of rakija. The sound filling your ears are tunes forged from the Byzantine, Ottoman and Greek musical fires - injected with wild gypsy flavour to give it distinct rhythm and flow. From your first step into the prefecture, you'll be greeted with the trill of trumpets and horns at any hour of the day. 

We arrived to the greeting of the overlapping of tooting scales of musicians. At first it sounds like a drunken song, the fatigue of five days non-stop playing. But it was only the outskirts of the town. We would soon feel the full force of the menagerie of brass bands. 

While weaving through the gauntlet of food and beer stalls and people all soaking in the summer heat, I couldn't help but wonder how a vegetarian could survive out here. I have never seen so many spit roasts displaying what must have been a small farm massacre of lambs and pigs sacrificed for the staple meat and bread menu on offer. My eyes widened taking in the scene. Pushing onward through the trumpet lovers and curious new comers, I found myself swaying through the dimly drunk carnivores, not really knowing what I had just stepped in to.

With the festival initiation under my belt, so began my education in how life goes in Guča... Rakija in hand, Lazar and Ana, our family hosts, welcomed us to their town. Half a litre of Serbian culture later, and so much affection for the family who opened their home to us; the muted sounds of trumpets, trombones, tubas, accordians and bass drums continued to serenades us just a street away. "Okay, you are ready," announced Lazar while pouring us both another nip of homemade schelvovitsa. "Now you can understand our music", he added while supporting himself on his garden wall. Taking another sip of scheilvavitsa, I sat back and thought... Ahh, I was deaf, but now my ears can see!

Brass! And Ohhh... the chaos of Balkan Brass!! 

Over the course of 3 nights and 4 days, I experienced Guča, 'the trumpet capital of the world’. The music never stops. After their performances, the bands who go there primarily for the competition take to the streets. Infiltrating themselves into bars, restaurants and anyone who will listen. Musicians roam wild and free, busking their repertoire into the pre dawn hours and after a short morning nap, they're back at it with the sunrise. They live a symbiotic existence with their instruments, as though their music making was breathing the party life in to them with every inhalation and exhalation and not the other way around.  

The last night of the festival features Goran Bregović, one of the most internationally acclaimed performers to come out of the Balkans. The open air stadium roared with appreciation as he pumped out each feeling filled hit. You might not know what he's singing about, but you can't help but throw your arms in the air and let the music send wild hip wiggles through your body. Only when bring yourself back into the crowd do you see that everyone feels just like you do. 

What you will find more and more, is that festivals that developed their reputation on delivering a sweet sample of bands in a particular genre, or an exhibition of a country's characteristic culture are now, sadly, evolving into a fusion of (usually) western influence, using a more pop music line-up to attract the masses and maximise ticket sales. It's almost as though all the festivals of the world are losing their individuality and evolving into a general music show. The magic of being in a big festival takes hold, but you could be anywhere in the world. Coachella Valley, Glastonbury, Niigata or Byron Bay - what makes you really feel these places? Are you really submerged in the culture of a town and it's people thanks to the music?

The Serbian Prime Minister encapsulated the essence of Guca when he was quoted on his thoughts of the festival:

Guča represents in the best way what Serbia is today; its openness, belief in oneself, hospitality, party and music. [The] trumpet festival is a confirmation of our courage and joy both in good and bad times. It represents people's return to the roots, joy and meaning of life. It speaks about who we are, what we are, our urges. We express our joy and sadness with [the] trumpet, and also buried with the sounds of [the] trumpet... Those that can't understand and love Guča, can't understand Serbia.