Tsvetan Nedyalkov

The classical guitar course at the Lyubomir Pipkov National Music School in Sofia gave Tsvetan Nedyalkov his technique; the pop and jazz department of the National Academy of Music gave him a second language, and he has used both. Born in 1969, he has played the classical repertoire as soloist with the Sofia Philharmonic and with the orchestras of Plovdiv, Varna, Stara Zagora, Burgas, Vidin, Vratsa and Yambol, while as guitarist of the Ku-Ku Band he has worked in Britain, Spain, Greece, Canada and across the United States — London, Madrid, Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, Toronto. He is a professor at the National Academy of Music, where he teaches pop and jazz guitar, and has taken that teaching to the Academy's branch in Burgas; he gives masterclasses and sits on the juries of international festivals. In March 2014 he took the solo part in Fairytales for Guitar, a family programme with the Sofia Philharmonic shared with Angelina Gavrilova and Stefaniya Koleva. He won first prize three times at the Young Musician competition in Chirpan, in 1983, 1985 and 1987, and a second prize at the classical guitar competition in Gotse Delchev. Television has used him steadily, in the bands of Ku-ku, Kanaleto and Slavi's Show and in the formats Music Idol, Sing with Me and The Voice of Bulgaria. He plays in the Acoustic Trio 3000 and wrote the music for its album Yo-ho, which in 2012 took the award of the American label Indiacoustic for best instrumental album of the year.