Beyond the Divide: The Different New Music Festival in Belgrade (1984–1986)

Archival materials for the Different New Music Festival, which was held in the mid-1980s under the auspices of the Students’ Cultural Centre (SKC) in Belgrade, reveal the multi-layered interplay of culture, politics, and ideologies of socialist and non-aligned Yugoslavia. A young generation of composers in Belgrade, who served on the Music Editorial Team of the SKC, organised three annual editions of the Different New Music Festival (1984–1986), seeking to revitalise the pluralist musical landscape of the 1960s. In a world divided into two military and political blocs—a period during which arts from the East were practically inaccessible in the West and vice versa—the SKC Festival became a hotspot for cultural exchange of local and international musical experimentalism, bringing together artists from both Blocs. Scrutinising the Festival’s programme conception, this paper examines the Different New Music Festival as a significant factor in the transnational neo-avant-garde network, whereby Yugoslav composers participated in shaping European experimental and minimalist music.