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“Good music from other and different ages in music should be performed as if it has been freshly composed”, Miltcho Leviev wrote in an annotation to the album The Song of the Clown. The music in the album was composed in the early 20 c. by Pantscho Wladigeroff, a Bulgarian classic who has trained generations of musicians in Bulgaria. Milcho Leviev is among his most brilliant disciples. A jazz pianist and composer, he had a successful start in his home country, but emigrated in 1970. In 1969 Leviev asked his professor Wladigeroff for permission to orchestrate his early work Foxtrot for a large symphony orchestra. This is how the score was made that was later recorded by Wladigeroff’s late son Alexander. Foxtrot is part of the album The Song of the Clown.
“The idea for the album originated seven years ago”, explains Ivan Mintchev, producer of the CD. “Back then Milcho Leviev found the Pantscho Wladigeroff scores written in the period when the great Bulgarian composer worked for the Max Reinhardt Theater. We were supported by Mrs. Nadia Sotirova from the Pantscho Wladigeroff Museum and by Prof. Bogdan Bogdanov, Chairman of New Bulgarian University Board of Trustees. Milcho Leviev created arrangements of Wladigeroff’s theatre music by strictly following the scores. He has added a few instruments to achieve a jazz flavor.”
Trumpeter Ventzi Blagoev, jazz singer Vicky Almazidu and actor Itsko Fintsi joined the concert for the premiere of the CD. They also took part in the recording. The concert featured bassist Vesselin Vesselinov-Eco and percussionist Stoyan Yankulov. In his review to the CD, renowned composer and conductor, Prof. Vassil Kazandjiev, wrote: “Only a musician of the caliber of Milcho Leviev can afford interpreting and developing the ideas that stem from the theater music created by the early Wladigeroff”. Listen to one of the most remarkable tracks in the CD, The Soldier’s Songл
