site.btaOctober 18, 1908: Newly Established Bulgarian Operatic Society Stages its First Test Performance in Sofia

On October 18, 1908, the newly established Bulgarian Operatic Society (renamed National Opera in 1922) staged its first test performance: excerpts from Gounod's Faust and Verdi's Il Trovatore.

The foundations of Bulgarian opera go back even farther, says the chronicle of the National Opera and Ballet on its website. In 1890, three Bulgarian musicians Dragomir Kazakov, Ivan Slavkov and Angel Bukoreshtliev organized the first opera troupe in Bulgaria as a branch of the "Sofia Drama and Opera Troupe". Its bill included 12 whole operas and parts of 11 operas, performed by Bulgarian, Czech and Italian singers accompanied by piano, the Guards Orchestra, the orchestra of the Sixth Infantry Regiment and members of the Italian Singing Society. Those performances turned out to be surprisingly successful. The operatic company was disbanded in 1892 amid financial difficulties.

Over the following years, interest in opera was rekindled and the history of opera in Bulgaria came to this date - October 18, 1908, when the Bulgarian Operatic Society had its first rehearsal performance of Faust and Il Trovatore.

"Opera Druzhba" was officially registered in the names of Dragomir Kazakov, Konstantin Mihailov-Stoyan, Ivan Vulpe, Dimitar Popivanov and Stoyan Nikolov. Besides them, the troupe also includes Zlatka Kurteva, Bogdana Gyuzeleva-Vulpe, Mara Vasileva, Olga Orlova, Doichinka Kolarova, Zhelyu Minchev, Panayot Dimitrov, conductors Henrich Wisner, Alois Matsak, Todor Hadjiev, choirmaster Dobri Hristov. From the end of 1908, the formation of a full-time opera choir began.

On June 5, 1909, the Sofia opera performed its first production of an entire opera: Pagliacci by Leoncavallo. Along with works from world opera classics, its bill also included Bulgarian operas, including Poor Woman by Emanuil Manolov, Stone and Price by Ivan Ivanov and Vaclav Kautsky, Borislav by Maestro Georgi Atanasov and Tahir Begovitsa by Dimitar Hadjigeorgiev.