On March 2, in the “Bulgaria” hall, Lyudmil Angelov will perform an interesting and rarely played work for piano and orchestra by Claude Debussy.
A fantasy for piano and orchestra attracts the attention of the Bulgarian pianist and he studies its history with interest. He comes across curious moments, checks every detail of the “life” of the score and thus comes to the conviction that it is a “valuable” (in his words) work for piano and orchestra. “I think that Debussy has long gone down in the history of the piano, as one of the brightest talents, the most original composers of piano music. In this line of thought, I am really very pleased that I was able to realize an old dream of mine – to fulfill this Fantasia” – says the pianist in an interview with Classic FM radio, shortly before going to his first rehearsal with the Classic FM Orchestra- M tel and conductor Grigor Palikarov. “In the process of work, I found different versions of the work, dug around and luckily managed to find the second version – corrected by Debussy himself, which became available to the world in 1968. Since then, it has become the performed version of the work. And rightly so, because /as Debussy himself says in one of his comments/, he did not want to “abandon this child of his”….But for me Fantasia is a work that already bears the characteristic marks of Debussy’s style, regardless , that he wrote it so young and subsequently corrected it” – added Lyudmil Angelov. “Perhaps few people know, but the French composer was very annoyed by the fact that his music was defined as impressionistic – Ludmil Angelov continues – And he asked: what exactly does impressionistic mean? And rightly so…I thought a lot when I read this phrase of Debussy’s. What exactly is impressionism in music, who can give an exact formulation? Undoubtedly, there are some parallels with fine art, but since Debussy himself did not accept this “title” for his music, there is obviously some reason”. After the Bulgarian performance of Debussy’s Fantasia for Piano, Ludmil Angelov will happily add this unique concerto for piano and orchestra to his repertoire and intends to perform the work once or twice more before the end of the year. In April, the pianist will also record Pancho Vladigerov’s Fifth Piano Concerto /with the SO of the BNR and the conductor Nayden Todorov/, which will complete his work on the integral edition of all the piano concertos of the Bulgarian composer /for the English company Toccata Classics/. The project is well advanced and will probably begin its commercial distribution around the world in the autumn. The preparations for the second edition of the “Piano Extravaganza” festival / September 22-30 of this year/ are well advanced. According to Lyudmil Angelov, “something we wanted to do for a long time” will happen in the very first concert – the famous Bulgarian singer Alexandrina Pendachanska will take part in it. Especially for the festival, our great violinist Elmira Durvarova will come from New York, who, together with the Argentine pianist / performer of Argentine tango / Octavio Brunetti, will perform an entirely Argentinian program. After years of researching and interpreting the music of Frédéric Chopin in great depth, Ludmil Angelov now has, with reason, his generalizing and professional view of the piano music of the 19th century, and more specifically that of France. Here are his final thoughts: “The natural continuation of what Frédéric Chopin started is Claude Debussy with that terrible poetics of music… And as I read recently in a comment – Chopin is the missing link that connects the incredible richness of the French harpsichord school with the music of Debussy and Ravel – the great masters of the piano from the beginning of the 20th century”. You can listen to part of the interview on Classic FM radio here!
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