Matinée Concert

Lachezar Stankov (piano) & Ralitsa Naydenova (viola)

12:30, Sofia Gallery

Biographies:

Lachezar Stankov (piano)
Lachezar Stankov was born in Varna, Bulgaria, and began to learn the piano at the age of nine. A year later he was accepted at the Dobri Hristov College of Music and Arts, where he completed his high school education with a specialist music curriculum. He made his concert debut at the age of 12 in Holland, with recitals in Amsterdam and Utrecht, and at 16 he was selected to take part in a series of concerts with the Varna Philharmonic Orchestra, playing the Grieg piano concerto. He was invited back the following year to play Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue with the Varna and Shumen orchestras. In 2008 he performed Rachmaniov’s Rhapsody on a theme of Paganini with the North London Symphony orchestra.

He has played in many venues in Bulgaria and elsewhere, including two appearances at the annual Varna Summer International Festival and Sofia Winter Music Festival. He has also made recordings for Bulgarian national television.

Lachezar has won several national and international awards, including the Presto National Scholarship in 2002 and the Grand Prix of the Competition for Czech and Slovak Music in Prague in 2003, Finalist of the Concerto competition at the Royal College of Music in 2009. He was an Associate Board Scholar and graduated his BMus degree in performance at the Royal College of Music and is currently completing his Masters degree at Trinity Conservatoire as an Alfred Kitchin Scholar.

Ralitsa Naydenova (viola)
Bulgarian violinist Ralitsa Naydenova had graduated from NMA’Prof PanchoVladigerov’, Sofia under the guidance of Stoika Milanova. She studied Master of Arts at Royal Academy of Music with Prof Lydia Mordkovich. Ralitsa has been involved in wide variety of activities including solo, chamber music, orchestra and festivals. She has appeared as soloist with Italian Youth Orchestra last year. Currently she is doing Master program on Viola at Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance under the guidance of Rivka Golani.