Music instruments are his toys since childhood. To this day he is inspired by all new electronic instruments in music. Valentin Lazar is a composer; he teaches music in a school in Tel Aviv and he is the author of a textbook on synthesizer music.

This year we mark 45 years since the creation of the first studio for electronic music in Bulgaria. That happened back in 1974 at the Bulgarian National Radio. Then young Simo Lazarov received the support of the administration for a studio for electronic music with latest music equipment for that time. Lazarov was experimenting and composing in a music style totally new at the time. Simo lazarov was born to a family of musicians and started playing the piano at five. The same holds good for his son – Valentin Lazar. As a child he loved the days, when his father was taking him to the Radio House.

“From early childhood I used to accompany my father – Simo Lazarov, at his concerts and everywhere else. I was 6-7 then. I remember his meetings with his colleagues, musicians – they were something greatly interesting for me”, Valentin explains. "I keep that memory of the BNR and the electronic music studio – of the enormous “Sinti 100” synthesizer. It was as big as a wall, full of hundreds of buttons, which made possible the extraction of the sound, even though it took several days to do that.”

At 15 Lazar won a scholarship allowing him to study in Israel. He went there, but he never forgot the piece of advice his father gave him: “Everything you learn – try to forget, so that you can continue creating following your initial instinct”. These words remind us of the fact that the more we learn in a certain sphere, the further away we step from the motivation to experiment. Valentin Lazar remembers the days before the audition.

“For me this story is related to certain events – a concert on December 13, 1991, before the National Palace of Culture. It was a concert my father launched, calling it “Christmas in the Sky”. There was a lot of everything – people, lazars, fireworks and an incredibly cold night. Several months of efforts were put in that concert, and on the next day I had to go for my scholarship audition. It all happened like in a dream, but happily I passed and entered the programme.”

Once in Israel, and without speaking Hebrew, Valentin Lazar entered a school of enhanced computer sciences classes and a special language course. He had little time to get acquainted with the language – only 3-4 months, because everyone in the class spoke only in Hebrew. After the end of the scholarship he returned to Bulgaria. Here he graduated in Music Pedagogy from Sofia University and Computer Music and Sound Design from New Bulgarian University. Today Valentin Lazar lives in Tel Aviv, where he has his own music studio. Besides as a composer, he works as a music teacher at a secondary school. According to him the students he meets every week are the best critics. When something is not to their liking or they loose interest, they show it straight away. On the other hand, if you capture their attention, they are a very thankful audience.

As to the Bulgarian community there, Valentin says he is in contact with friends from Sofia, who have emigrated to Israel; but also that he ahs made many new friends there. “The connection between Bulgaria and Israel is quite strong and that makes me very happy. Many Bulgarian groups come here to perform and Israeli musicians also visit Bulgaria for concerts. I never lost touch with Bulgaria through the years. My contacts are rather on a friendly basis, but I would be glad to turn them into professional ones as well”, Valentin Lazar adds.

English version: Iva Letnikova