Starting on 22 May until 10 July the music lovers in Sofia will be able to choose from more than 30 concerts – solo, chamber and symphony ones on the playbill of the 48^th edition of Sofia Music Weeks festival. The festival is holder of the distinction Europe for Festivals, Festivals for Europe for 2017-2018 awarded by the European Festival Association.

Days ahead of the opening of the Sofia Music Weeks the organizers broke the news about the opening concert: the guest orchestra at Bulgaria Hall in Sofia will be no less than the orchestra of the Marinsky Theater in St. Petersburg, Russia, led by celebrity conductor Valery Gergiev.

“Negotiations went on for a few months”, explains Momchil Georgiev, program manager of the festival. “Therefore we were not able to announce the even earlier – in fact before we had the confirmation that Valery Gergiev would be able to join the concert in Sofia in between two other appearances. On 19 May he conducted a concert in the open at Trafalgar Sq. in London and has a concert a day after his planned concert in Sofia. For thirty years already this foremost conductor has not been in Bulgaria. Before that in the course of 6 to 7 years he conducted concerts in Burgas, Ruse and Sofia. He has conducted three concerts with the Bulgarian National Radio Symphony Orchestra and these are kept in the Golden Audio Library of BNR. In the Golden Book of the BNR Symphony Orchestra Valery Gergiev has written the following: „You know how much I love you!“ So, the motto of the concert is Comeback. Looking at the Sofia Music Weeks program one can see that we are the festival of premieres, of Bulgarian music, of young performers, of the combination of Bulgarian and foreign projects and musicians. We have an important section, European Capitals Visit Sofia. This time the guests are Bulgarians with international careers but who are little known in Bulgaria, for example pianists Lilia Boyadjieva and Maria Martinova. Lora Tchekoratova (piano) and Georgy Valtchev (violin) will come from USA, and Anna Levy (piano) from Canada. The playbill also features Ludmil Angelov, Plamena Mangova and Evgeni Bozhanov – who are internationally acclaimed pianists whom Bulgarian audience loves so much. For the first time the festival is under the patronage of the President of the Republic of Bulgaria. For the first time we have introduced the section Composer in Focus. This is Gheorghi Arnaoudov who turns 60 this year. There are premieres of his works, a few concerts including music by him and the official celebration will be on 21 June at Studio 1 of the Bulgarian National Radio. We have also included for the first time Instrument in Focus. This year it is the cello, and of course, cellists who are from different generations and of different calibers and styles. They have prepared little known but lovely music for solo cello. The program of Sofia Music Weeks also includes choral concerts. For the first time in the history of the festival a National Meeting of Boys’ Choirs has been organized and it is due on 24 June at the hall of Pancho Vladigerov National Academy of Music. Among vocal works I should like to point to the program the Unknown Nenov – quite interesting and unknown masterpieces of vocal art created by Bulgarian composer Dimitar Nenov in the 1920s and 1930s. Graduate of the National Academy of Music in the class of Rusko Ruskov, baritone Marcin Bronikowski has chosen to celebrate his 25^th creative anniversary at the Sofia Opera House where the career of the famous soloist started. A concert is planned of mezzo soprano Svetlina Stoyanova who is still a student but has already won major contests and has launched an international career. On 23 May is the concert of Russian pianist Elena Bashkirova: we are honored to have such first-class performer appearing at Sofia Music Weeks. She will be soloist of the Sofia Philharmonic Orchestra.”

There are many world premieres in the pipeline, including works written especially for the Sofia Music Weeks festival, and presentations of albums with classical music. The performers we will be listening to come from Austria, Great Britain, Canada, Spain, Italy, Kosovo, Poland, Luxembourg and Bulgaria.

English Daniela Konstantinova

Music: Sofia Music Weeks

1.  Piano Trio by Pancho Vladigerov, fragment, Ardenza piano trio

2.  Variations on One String on a Theme by Rossini performed by Diliana Momchilova (cello) and Lora Tchekoratova (piano)

3.  Concerto for Cello and Orchestra by Antonin Dvorak, First Movement, soloist Lubomir Georgiev with the Bulgarian National Radio Symphony Orchestra, conductor Valery Gergiev