150 years since the premiere of “Tristan und Isolde” by Richard Wagner

The soloists, the conductor, the director and the entire team are working hard for the premiere on 26 February

During the last weeks the artistic and production-technical teams are busy with the upcoming on 26 February new premiere of Sofia Opera – Wagner’s marking work of art “Tristan und Isolde”. Many hours continue the hard rehearsals. At the moment the Director Plamen Kartraloff and the Assistant Directors Vera Petrova and Yulia Krasteva are putting the finishing touches of scenes from Act III of one of the most difficult works by the German composer and philosopher.

Parallel with the spectacles on the stage of Sofia Opera and Ballet, rehearsals are made also at the Inter Expo Centre and on Small stage of Sofia Opera and Ballet. Our exceptional performers Martin Iliev (the Bulgarian Tristan), Tsvetana Bandalovska, Radostina Nikolaeva and Mariana Zvetkova (the Bulgarian  performers of Isolde), Atanas Mladenov (the Bulgarian Kurwenal), Krasimir Dinev and Plamen Papazikov (in the role of the Young Sailor) are elaborating the scenes, bringing into life the first in our country production of “Tristan und Isolde”. 150 years after its premiere on 10 June 1865 in Munich, the moving love drama will shake the audience from Sofia and the country, as well as the numerous guests from abroad, who will arrive specially for the premiere performance of this title by Wagner on Bulgarian stage.

Fully understandable is the excitement of the entire team working on the title. Important is each detail, each gesture, each facial expression and look. Impressive is the diligence with which all artists are approaching the development of the characters. All this happens with the piano accompaniment by Yolanta Smolyanova and Milen Stanev, under the conductor’s look and direction of Velizar Genchev. The guest-performing young and promising conductor Constantin Trinks, who has a remarkable career in Germany, has already made his first rehearsals with the orchestra during several days. Musical and Language Consultant is again the “pillar” of the Bulgarian “Ring” by Wagner, maestro Richard Trimborn.

A little more than one month before the long-awaited premiere of the prestigious for each theatre title the efforts of everyone, busy with it, are directed to the achievement of the maximum. Everybody is clear that after the grandiose success of the first in our country and on the Balkans “Der Ring des Nibelungen” the responsibility for the first stage performance of “Tristan und Isolde” in Sofia is even greater. The artistic team, which will present this title, includes also the well-known and valuable Set Designer Miodrag Tabacki, already known in Bulgaria (“Tosca”, “Turandot”, “Lakmé”) and the Costume Designer Leo Kulaš (“Tosca”).

Dimitar SOTIROV