{"id":11830,"date":"2026-03-05T15:34:24","date_gmt":"2026-03-05T13:34:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/varnasummerfest.org\/event\/official-opening-2026"},"modified":"2026-06-30T15:33:44","modified_gmt":"2026-06-30T12:33:44","slug":"official-opening-2026","status":"publish","type":"event","link":"https:\/\/varnasummerfest.org\/en\/program\/official-opening-2026","title":{"rendered":"Official Opening 2026"},"content":{"rendered":"

27 June, 8:00 PM, Festival and Congress Centre Hall 1<\/strong><\/p>\n

Varna State Opera Symphony Orchestra and Choir, Ch\u043erusmaster Teodora Georgieva
\nBulgarian National Radio Mixed Choir, conductor Lyubomira Alexandrova
\nChildren\u2019s Choir \u201cDobri Hristov\u201d Varna, conductor Galina Stanisheva
\nwith Ilina Mihaylova – sopran and Marius Donkin – actor <\/strong><\/p>\n

Conductor Delyana Lazarova<\/strong><\/p>\n

Soloists:
\nDmitry Sitkovetsky \u2013 violin
\nAndrei Ionita \u2013 cello
\nBarry Douglas \u2013 piano<\/strong><\/p>\n

Programme:
\nPancho Vladigerov \u2013 \u201cVardar\u201d Rhapsody
\nMilko Kolarov \u2013 Cantat\u0430-Poem for \u201cthe Most Bulgarian Time\u201d 1876, dedicated to the 100th festival anniversary \u2013 premiere
\nLudwig van Beethoven \u2013 Triple Concerto for Violin, Cello and Piano C major, Op. 56<\/p>\n

The jubilee edition of the Varna Summer International Music Festival begins with a concert that would be a pride of any major festival worldwide. According to a long-standing tradition, the opening concert is entrusted to the Varna Symphony Orchestra, which this year celebrates its 80th anniversary.
\nDelyana Lazarova will take the stage to conduct the Varna State Opera Symphony Orchestra. After her highly acclaimed debut at the BBC Proms with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra last season, she is boldly stepping up as one of the world\u2019s rising stars in conducting.
\nThree magnificent musicians will perform Beethoven\u2019s Triple Concerto – Barry Douglas, who had won the 1986 \u201cTchaikovsky\u201d International Piano Competition, a pianist with a remarkably sustainable career, definitely one of today\u2018s leading pianists; Dmitry Sitkovetsky, regular guest soloist of the world\u2019s finest orchestras – a true Renaissance man (conductor, mentor, visionary and successful writer but above all, an exquisite violinist) and Andrei Ioni\u021ba, Gold Medalist of the 2015 International Tchaikovsky Competition, one of the most compelling and expressive cellists of his generation.
\nBeethoven\u2019s triple-soloist concerto, quite innovative at the time it had been composed, will follow the opening piece – Pancho Vladigerov’s “Vardar” Rhapsody, followed by monumental work especially composed for “Varna Summer” by Vladigerov\u2019s student, Milko Kolarov, an important representative of Bulgarian musical culture. There will be two of the finest Bulgarian choirs (the Bulgarian National Radio Mixed Choir and the Varna State Opera Choir) along with the Dobri Hristov Children\u2019s Choir, named after one of the festival’s founders, Varna\u2019s own composer Dobri Hristov.
\nMarking the full century since the very beginning of the festival and the 80th birth anniversary of the composer Milko Kolarov, this is a concert quite symbolic of the long journey of Bulgaria\u2019s oldest music festival.<\/p>\n

Download programm – part I<\/a>
\nDownload programm – part II<\/a><\/p>\n

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27 June, 8:00 PM, Festival and Congress Centre Hall 1 Varna State Opera Symphony Orchestra and Choir, Ch\u043erusmaster Teodora Georgieva Bulgarian National Radio Mixed Choir, conductor Lyubomira Alexandrova Children\u2019s Choir \u201cDobri Hristov\u201d Varna, conductor Galina Stanisheva with Ilina Mihaylova – sopran and…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":11832,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":[],"eventcat":[48],"organizer":[],"event_tags":[80],"location":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/varnasummerfest.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/event\/11830"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/varnasummerfest.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/event"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/varnasummerfest.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/event"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/varnasummerfest.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/varnasummerfest.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11830"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/varnasummerfest.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/event\/11830\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12397,"href":"https:\/\/varnasummerfest.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/event\/11830\/revisions\/12397"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/varnasummerfest.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11832"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/varnasummerfest.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11830"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"eventcat","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/varnasummerfest.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/eventcat?post=11830"},{"taxonomy":"organizer","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/varnasummerfest.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/organizer?post=11830"},{"taxonomy":"event_tags","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/varnasummerfest.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/event_tags?post=11830"},{"taxonomy":"location","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/varnasummerfest.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/location?post=11830"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}