Svetoslav Borisov animates the Magdeburg Philharmonic Orchestra to play in a way
that is as springy as it is passionate, even ravishing, and at the same time highly
differentiated. The tempi, with fine phrasing, are pleasantly brisk, at times even
furious […] This is a modern Mozart[…]
Opernwelt (Don Giovanni)
Svetoslav Borisov and his orchestra accompany in such a colourful as well as
palatable way, so sensitive and wide awake, that it is a great pleasure.
Opernwelt (Ariadne auf Naxos)
A young conductor and an orchestra with especially long Bruckner experience – here
it was a sparkling combination. Kronenzeitung (Bruckner-Orchester Linz, Bruckner 4)
The Bulgarian conductor Svetoslav Borisov is Principal Conductor and Deputy Music Director at the Magdeburg Opera since the season 2016/2017 and remains Artistic Director of the Austrian chamber orchestra CON FUOCO in Graz. From 2013 – 2015 he was assistant of Music Director Steven Sloane and conductor at the Bochum Symphony Orchestra and until 2016 chief conductor of the Opera in Varna. He maintains close contact with both institutions as a frequent guest.
During the season 2023/2024 he will in Magdeburg lead a new production of The Love of Three Oranges, the children’s opera Der Wind in den Weiden by Elena Kats-Chernin, a new ballet production with music by Shostakovitch, Henryk Górecki and Philip Glass along with several concerts.
Among the operas he has led in recent years, we should underline Gounod‘s Faust and Roméo et Juliette, Barber‘s Vanessa, Aida, Falstaff, Rigoletto, Hänsel und Gretel, Salome, Tosca, Turandot, Der Fliegende Holländer, Don Pasquale, Eine Nacht in Venedig, La finta giardiniera, Don Giovanni and Elena Langer’s Figaro Gets A Divorce.
Svetoslav Borisov has obtained rich experience through his collaboration with many orchestras, among them the Beethoven Orchestra Bonn, the Bochum and Düsseldorf Symphony Orchestras, the Göttingen Symphony Orchestra, the Neue Philharmonie Westfalen and the Brandenburg Symphony Orchestra. He has appeared as guest conductor in Austria, Belgium, China, Germany, Greece, Lithuania, Israel, Turkey and the Ukraine. Several years ago, he stepped in at the last minute for Krzysztof Penderecki with the Graz Philharmonic and has been invited to the orchestra again in 2018/2019. He is also a regular guest at the Bruckner-Orchester Linz. In the summer of 2022 he conducted the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra at the Jerusalem Lyric Opera Festival as well as the Istanbul National Symphony Orchestra at the Varna Summer Festival. In June 2023, he gave his debut with the Tonkünstler-Orchester Niederösterreich at the Grafenegg Festival.
The season 2023/2024 will see his return to the Bochum and Brandenburg Symphony Orchestras as well as to the National Opera in Sofia.
In 2007, Svetoslav Borisov founded the chamber orchestra CON FUOCO, which has appeared successfully in Austria and abroad. In the chamber opera cycle of the Musikverein Graz he achieved great success with his orchestra in Donizetti’s Rita and Lortzing’s Die Opernprobe. The production of Suppé’s Die schöne Galathée in the original version was televised by the ORF. He made his debut with the chamber orchestra in Vienna’s Musikverein in June 2019 with Julia Hagen as soloist.
After first studies in trumpet at the Music University in Sofia, Svetoslav Borisov began his conducting studies at the University of Music and Performing Arts in Graz, graduating with honors in 2010. His
earliest engagements led him to the Stadttheater Klagenfurt and - at first as Kapellmeister - to the Opera in Varna, and a number of times with great success as a guest to the State Opera in Sofia. In 2014 he appeared as a guest conductor at the Musiktheater im Revier Gelsenkirchen and in 2016 gave his debut at the Istanbul Opera with the ballet Le Corsaire by Adolphe Adam.
Svetoslav Borisov attended masterclasses with - among others - Ralf Weikert, Bernard Haitink, Jesus Lopéz Cobos and Kurt Masur. In 2010 he participated in the International Conducting Academy Bochum led by Steven Sloane, Sylvain Cambreling and Roger Norrington. The magazine “Opernwelt” nominated him in October 2023 as the best conductor of the year for his performance of Ariadne auf Naxos.
