Decrescendo.net · 07.02.2024
For me, these encounters, organised by the institution's management in the person of Nayden Todorov, are events of several kinds of significance. [...] [The tendency reasserted itself in the concert with soloist Stephen Kovacevich (25 January).] [...] Already from the start this mood was set out, articulated in the orchestral introduction, in which both the dynamic contrast and the thematic character were delivered intensely, yet with a discipline that the conductor demanded of the orchestra this time — and not only in the Mozart concerto. [...]
What I found especially appealing was the complete absence of sentimentality in the slow movement — this was a personal reflection synthesising what had come before — and here one heard not only the sonic ideas of a great musician but also the flexible, apt response of Todorov and the orchestra; it was a very beautiful, indeed substantive, conversation between the two sides of the piece, whose dramaturgy rose to a full and compelling height. [...]
Nayden Todorov had logically chosen Beethoven's Fifth Symphony for the second half of the concert — and not only for its tonal kinship with the concerto, but for the progression, so to speak, of dramatic collisions, established here almost visibly. I had some misgivings about the reading and realisation of the "fateful symphony," which is rarely spared certain speculative excesses. But to my satisfaction, Todorov's customary energy and enthusiasm were this time subordinated to active aural monitoring and sonic control over the orchestra — an approach that proved highly effective, aimed at building the authentic Beethovenian reality of this symphony. The conductor drew back from the temptations the composition offers (of contrast, of thematic collision, of unstoppable headlong motion, of the effect of extreme crescendos) and placed everything at the service of logic — of the unfolding of musical time, of style, of the orchestra's ordering and the balance among its groups. Special attention, I think, was also paid to intensity of sound. The symphony sounded, in its full dramatic scope, dense, purposeful, steadily maintaining balance and measure in its development. This was a successfully realised approach to the reading of the work.
Three days after this concert, baritone Bryn Terfel stepped onto the podium of Hall "Bulgaria" (28 January). Even his very entrance before the orchestra was already theatre. This man, this artist, captivates, quite simply devours the stage and draws the audience to him — and extends a fellow musician's hand to win over both conductor Nayden Todorov and the Philharmonic. [...]
Despite my fears that in so short a time the orchestra could not possibly "enter into" so different a repertoire — in genre and in style — the orchestra, under Nayden Todorov's baton, made every effort to be a genuine musical partner to the singers. And that gives me grounds to hope that Terfel will come again — at least in concert, since we cannot experience him live in a full opera production in Sofia. 
