Venezia Karamanova is a choral conductor with great experience, winner of prestigious national and international awards. At the end of 2011, she added another award to her collection of distinctions - this time it was the Golden Lyre of the Union of Bulgarian Musicians and Dancers. The occasion - the 35th anniversary since the start of her professional career.
© Photo: personal archive
Venezia Karamanova graduated from the Sofia-based National School of Music Lyubomir Pipkov with piano. Then, she studied at the Pancho Vladigerov National Music Academy in the class of famous piano pedagogue Professor Panka Pelishek. At the same time, she graduated in Choral Conducting.
"It was a return to my first love in music. I remember I attended choir rehearsals until late in the evening as a child. My mother sang in the choir at a community center in Sofia. She was soloist in some of the songs. This choir was very active and participated in festivals and concerts and I was always in the concert hall. My love for choral singing was born then. Later, my encounter with Professor Liliya Gyuleva had a decisive role in my career. Her philosophy was: "Practice is the best teacher of all”. She managed to find work for all of her students as conductors of small groups. I also went through this. But my professional debut was with the National Radio Children's Choir, which was 35 years ago.”
Venice Karamanova works in the Children's Choir of the Bulgarian National Radio as a second conductor. She has worked on dozens of records for the BNR and conducted a series of performances at prestigious stages at home and abroad. She prepares the young trainee chositers for the big stage and conducts individual rehearsals with the soloists.
In the early 1990s, following a suggestion by the Bulgarian Orthodox Church, Venezia Karamanova set up the group entitled The Children of Orpheus - the first children's group for Orthodox music in the modern history of Bulgaria. The singers are between 5 and 15 years of age. Today, already grown-up, most of them are part of an youth chamber ensemble of the same name.
“The youth chamber choir "Children of Orpheus" exists since 1994 At that time, I had already gained experience in the Children's Radio Choir - the school of Academician Hristo Nedyalkov who is the artistic director and main conductor of this famous choir. Over the years, I got to know not only my work but also myself. I had a dream - to perform Orthodox music. Created by known and unknown composers, church chants are an important part of the medieval history of Bulgaria, an invaluable spiritual heritage. In the repertoire of "The Children of Orpheus' this music takes an important place. We also perform works of Bulgarian composers. Last year, we sang at a medieval music festival in Croatia. We had great success. In recent years, I am looking for "new paths" to update the repertoire. The project on which I am now working is an interesting mixture of Orthodox music with jazz elements. It is written by the famous Bulgarian jazz pianist and composer Lyubomir Denev”.
Venezia Karamanova is a university lecturer as well. She teaches a class in choral conducting at Sofia University "St. Kliment Ohridski ". She also set up a Chamber Students' Choir which won the gold medal in an international competition for church music in the town of Preveza, Greece. At the same forum, The Children of Orpheus choir received the bronze. And their leader Venezia Karamanova returned to Bulgaria with the award for Best Conductor.
A few seasons ago, Ms. Karamanova managed to revive the cycle of concerts entitled Viva la Musica initiated years ago by Professor Lilia Gyuleva as a series of choral performances. A novelty now is the inclusion of chamber music. Along with Mrs. Tanya Nikleva-Vladeva, conductor of the Sofia-based female choir Hristina Morfova, Venezia prepares the program and takes care of advertising. "Viva la Musica" provides a stage for talented musicians from different generations.
Translated by Rossitsa Petcova
