Boba Spasojevic Dies: 'I Could Not Fall Short'

Accordionist and composer Slobodan Boba Spasojevic died in Belgrade at 78, and the news spread through the entertainment scene on August 6, reaching musicians who had spent decades studying his intros. He was one of the most recognizable names in the Lipovica style of playing. His face rarely showed up on television, but his sound was heard on the records that shaped Serbian folk music.

He came from a family in which the accordion was passed down like a trade. His father, Ilija Spasojevic, was a composer of folk songs, his uncle Milija Spasojevic a virtuoso on the accordion and the author of kolo dances still played today, and he was also related to Budimir “Buca” Jovanovic. He spoke about it himself in one of the rare interviews he gave, to the show “Muzicka apoteka.”

I grew up in a household built entirely around the accordion. My father, Ilija Spasojevic, was a well known composer of folk songs (“Pastirica,” “Kud se zuris hej zivote,” “Da li zalis sto odlazim”). My uncle Milija Spasojevic was a true virtuoso on the accordion, the author of legendary songs and kolo dances (“S one strane Lipovice,” “Moj konjicu,” “Probija se kolovodja,” “Sumadijo, sumovita,” “Meljacko kolo,” “Uzicko,” “Orijent”). My uncle by marriage, Buca Jovanovic, was the father figure of many singing stars (Saban, Vida, Kvaka, Gvozden, Seki). It was easy for me. With a father, an uncle and an uncle by marriage like that, I could not fall short.

That modesty was his manner, but the numbers tell a different story. The family ensembles kept reshaping as people went their separate ways, and once Milija Spasojevic left for America, most of the playing fell to Ilija and Buca. Boba grew up inside that circle, played in his father’s and uncle’s orchestras, and in the 1980s formed his own.

A Sound Known by Its Intro

His signature stood behind songs still requested in taverns today. He wrote arrangements for Milance Radosavljevic, Cvele Radovanovic and Senad Milanovic, and his touch carries through “Tiho tece Kolubara,” “Secas li se kad smo klinci bili,” “Sviraj, sviraj harmoniko,” “Mnogo suza u ocima,” “Oci su moje mutne od dima,” “Niko nije ko nas dvoje” and “Ako odes nek ostane ljubav.”

How much he meant to singers is best told by Radosavljevic, who named their joint album from 1986 his best recorded work.

At first, I played on my own records with my own ensemble. Then it occurred to me that I might sing better if I handed the accordion and the orchestra over to a great master. So in 1986 I recorded the whole album “Tiho tece Kolubara” with master Boba Spasojevic. I maintain that it is the best played album I ever made.

This was a singer who had, until then, led his own ensemble on his own. Handing the accordion over to another man was a risk, and it went down as his career peak.

Why Was “Pruzi Ruku Na Rastanku” His Hardest Job?

Because it was recorded without the man who wrote it. Buca Jovanovic died in 1987, and the song was recorded in 1988 by Cvele Radovanovic, with the task of preserving Buca’s sound. That job went to Boba Spasojevic.

It was a heavy feeling, recording Buca’s songs without Buca. I sang them in the studio and kept remembering his last words: “Sing them the way you feel them.” He left me his final songs, and I took them as a covenant. Luckily for me, Slobodan Boba Spasojevic arranged and played them in Buca’s style. To this day I explain to top musicians that it is not Buca playing on “Pruzi ruku na rastanku,” it is Boba Spasojevic and his ensemble.

Radovanovic told this to Telegraf. In three years, from 1986 to 1988, Boba Spasojevic put his signature on two projects that his own singers each called the peak of their careers, one as the best album, the other as a rescued legacy.

Kolo Dances That Still Test Accordionists

Alongside his work with singers, he also recorded several records of folk kolo dances. Among accordionists, these have stayed in a class of their own:

• “Bobanova setnja”
• “Ruzmarinkino”
• “Ilijino”
• “Ficino”

Those compositions are treated as a benchmark in playing circles, and younger accordionists are still tested on them today. That part of his legacy owes nothing to radio programs or media reminders, it passes from instrument to instrument.

The Man Who Avoided the Camera

He avoided television appearances for nearly his entire career and rarely gave interviews. He agreed to talk to “Muzicka apoteka” only after a long persuasion, as Goran Milosevic wrote on Facebook. Because of that, the wider public knows him by his sound rather than his face, even though generations of singers knew exactly whose orchestra they wanted in the studio.

He spoke about his own place in that family just as sparingly.

It was not easy to find my own style next to such masters in my family. If I pulled even ten percent from each of them, it was worth it.