There is a good-intentioned, somewhat ethnographically parochial or misplaced tendency to hail the singer Amira Medunjanin as the finest exponent of sevdah – the Bosnian/Herzegovinan region's blue-note musical tradition of ecstatic, melancholic yearning and plaintive, exquisite pain. Or the Balkan Billie Holiday. Poppycock. She is a world-class vocalist in her own right. Furthermore, since Rosa in 2004, Amira Medunjanin has been getting better and better step-by-step. A crunch point occurred around the time of her and accordionist Merima Ključo's 2008 Zumra collaboration. A squabble over billing and a falling out occurred. I take no sides. For the record, with Iva Bittová and David Krakauer, Ključo co-set my resistance lyric ‘Kino Laterna’ for their trio Checkpoint KBK. In the wake of this spat Amira Medunjanin joined forces with the greatest collaborator of her career, Bojan Z. and the first fruits of that musical relationship appeared formally on the record with Amulette in 2011. His jazzy pianistics shook up and re-contextualised her music. Damar is a continuation of their stream of consciousness. It's a joyous affair that at times teeters on the brink of oblivion. The yeaning expressed in ‘Ah, što ćemo ljubav kriti’ (‘Oh, why do we have to hide our love’) is enough to break any heart. Amira does it with one voice and Boško Jović's nylon-strung guitar in an instrumental accompaniment so intense it rivals the guitarra portuguesa maestro Carlos Paredes on a very good day.