The new season of the BNR Symphony Orchestra kicked off with a concert by one of Bulgaria’s most talented pianists of the young generation, Evgeny Bozhanov on October 10. As always chief conductor Emil Tabakov and his team have made a meticulous selection of works from different periods and performers. Here is more from Maestro Tabakov:

“Our season is entirely dedicated to the Bulgarian National Radio’s 80^th anniversary. As always, we have endeavoured to select works that are interesting to the audience and the musicians alike. We have young conductors of world renown, foremost soloists from abroad as well as from Bulgaria. The season opened with a rising piano star and we shall end it the same way, this time with a pianist who has lived abroad for many years, so he may not be so well known to audiences in this country – Alexander Hinchev; he rarely performs here. So, that is the reason why I decided to invite him – he is a wonderful pianist. To my mind we should do our best so that Bulgarian musicians like him – and there are so many around the world – may come back to Bulgaria whenever they can and perform.”

The second concert for the season features one of the Bulgarian National Radio Symphony Orchestra soloists. Ass. Prof. Yassen Teodosiev, French horn, has been with the orchestra for over 20 years. Emil Tabakov:

“This lends variety to our programme. By and large at concerts the solo instruments are piano or violin, and only rarely wind instruments. This is a concert marking the birth anniversary of Richard Strauss celebrated around the world; he is a composer with numerous works for French horn. To sum up, the entire season is most diverse with regard to instrumental concerts.”

One of the original ideas this season is to present two works that have the same name – The Seasons by Joseph Haydn is performed very infrequently in Bulgaria because of its complexity and duration; the last time it was recorded was 40 years ago. The other work called Seasons is by Alexander Glazunov and has never been performed in Bulgaria before.

Another highlight in the National Radio Symphony Orchestra season is the participation of two young conductors with a brilliant career abroad; Rossen Gergov toured with the radio symphonists as well, while Yordan Kamdjalov recorded opera music with the orchestra some time ago.

“The programme in which he takes part is very engaging, all the more so knowing who the soloists are – the renowned piano duo Aglika Genova and Lyuben Dimitrov – so, I think the public will find it fascinating,” says Emil Tabakov.

The 2014/2015 season will offer audiences some genuine pearls of Russian music.

“The audiences love Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky and Nikolay Rimsky-Korsakov – people like to listen to music they know is good,” Emil Tabakov says. “We are marking 150 years since the birth of Alexander Glazunov and 100 – of Alexander Skriabin. At the beginning of the season we pay tribute to Anatoly Lyadov – who died 100 years ago – with his compact but so original Enchanted Lake. We always try to mark any anniversary of leading composers.”

There is one common denominator running through all past seasons of the BNR Symphony Orchestra. Ever since he has been working with the orchestra, Emil Tabakov has invariably included in its programme works by Dmitri Shostakovich. This year the Maestro has remained true to this tradition with symphony No. 14. Here is more from Emil Tabakov himself:

“I wanted to have all symphonies performed, recorded at the BNR and, if possible, released on CD, in full. Most of them are unknown to music fans, but they are unknown to musicians as well. In Bulgaria it is only the most popular of Shostakovich’s symphonies that people know, but his work in its entirety is wonderful and very useful if you want to build up an orchestra’s standard of performance. When I put together my seasonal plans I invariably have one composer whose symphony work is presented in its entirety. This is something we have done with the Sofia Philharmonic with composers like Ludwig Van Beethoven, Gustav Mahler, Anton Bruckner.”

English version: Milena Daynova