On 25 January 1935, Tsar Boris III signed the decree establishing the Bulgarian National Radio. The document, which officially marked the beginning of "Radio Sofia", as the Bulgarian National Radio (BNR) was then called, made radio broadcasting in Bulgaria state property. In June of that year, the poet and artist Panayot Todorov Hristov, better known by his pen name Sirak Skitnik, was appointed as the first director of public radio. Three musical ensembles were formed, including the forerunners of the Folk Music Orchestra and the BNR Big Band. In February 1936, our media opened a door to the world through its Foreign Broadcasts, now known as the Radio Bulgaria programme.

"Happy anniversary to all our colleagues and listeners, and now also to the readers and viewers of Bulgarian National Radio! - With these words, BNR Director General Milen Mitev greeted us and our listeners in a special interview for Radio Bulgaria. - Our biggest challenge as a media outlet with such a long history is to learn from the past, to modernise and to stand shoulder to shoulder with our newer competitors. It's all about how we stand out and what unique and valuable content we can offer our audience so that they choose us," says Mitev, who is convinced that as a public broadcaster, BNR should be present everywhere, on all platforms."

"We must reach out to our audience, not wait for them to come to us. We need to offer our services in the way that is easiest and most accessible for the audience, because that is the only way to fully fulfil our public mission. I think that Radio Bulgaria is a great example in this respect, because it started as a radio station (on short and medium waves - ed.) and now exists almost exclusively on the Internet. 

Through new technological expressions, it reaches an even wider audience through text, sound and image," says Milen Mitev. This feature of the present - being shaped by the digital age - led to the creation of the Digital Programmes Directorate at BNR in 2022. Its director is the journalist and writer Ivo Todorov. Its director is the journalist and writer Ivo Todorov.

Our directorate is streaming events and more, so users can see what's happening in real time, which is not strictly radio content. The celebration isn't limited to 25 January - it's all year round. 2025 is also exciting for us because we are launching three new websites and apps. The apps are BNR-NEWS (for news), BINAR - a platform for listening to audio-visual content and the third is Kids' BNR. These apps will be freely available".

"Any media content has a much longer lifespan in the digital environment," stresses Ivo Todorov, adding that BNR has a wealth of information available to its users at www.bnr.bg. At its core is the radio’s first website, created for Radio Bulgaria and maintained by a team led by Lyubomir Lazarov – who, for a long time, presented content created by reporters, editors, and translators of foreign language broadcasts for abroad, as well as in Bulgarian – for our compatriots around the world.

Today, Krassimir Martinov expresses his gratitude, first of all, to the people who, day after day, bring the idea of the Radio Bulgaria programme to life and, of course, to the management of public media for standing behind us and recognising the importance of this programme and the immense added value it brings to Bulgarian National Radio.

"This is one of my hopes for the future - that the state, in addition to the management of Radio Bulgaria, will be visionary and make a much more rational use of Radio Bulgaria. We are here and we will continue! Happy holidays to all our colleagues and to all our listeners and supporters!"

" I wish myself and all my colleagues that we do not lose this flame in us that makes us continue to work in BNR! - said Milen Mitev, Director General of BNR. - Because, at the risk of sounding clichéd, working in public service media is indeed a mission. It's not just a job, it's a responsibility to the whole of society, and I think it brings immense satisfaction. It's no secret that salaries in public media here are far from impressive, but many motivated professionals continue to work here. Obviously, it is not the salary that attracts them, but the opportunity to do something significant, because the media gives us the opportunity to try to change the world for the better, as far as we have the power to do so. My main wish is that we do not lose the desire to change the world for the better. Everything else can be sorted out more or less".

Happy Holidays, Bulgarian National Radio!

Read more about the events marking the 90th anniversary of Bulgarian National Radio here:

Photo: Ani Petrova, Irina Nedeva, BNR, personal archive