Belo Platno

Belo Platno (White Linen) is a music ensemble from Belgrade that plays the traditional music of the Balkans, mostly from Kosovo and Metohija and from Macedonia in the wider sense. It was founded in 1997, and one of its founders and its leader is Vladimir Simić, who plays the lute and other instruments.

Belo Platno was one of the first vocal and instrumental ensembles in Serbia to choose a modal approach to music, which belongs to the older tradition of the Balkans. Instead of major and minor harmony, its sound is built on the main melody and a steady drone beneath it, the bordun, and on the striking female voices of its singers, among them Svetlana Spajić, Anastasija Ostojić, Olja Njaradi and Dragana Tomić.

The ensemble plays traditional instruments such as the kaval, tambura, lute, the double flute dvojanka, def, goč and tarabuka, as well as the violin and cello, and Simić makes part of the instruments himself in a family workshop. Its first album, Belo Platno, came out on Atos in Belgrade in 2003, followed by a multimedia CD with Svetlana Spajić in 2006 and a live CD and DVD recorded in Russia in 2012. The group also appears on the compilations Serbia Sounds Global, Serbian Ethno Sound and Podignimo stupove.

A few of their recordings are gathered here in one playlist.