Conte (Fairy Tale), op. 46

Conte belongs to the set of piano pieces Vladigerov catalogued as his op. 46, part of the large body of miniatures he wrote alongside the concertos and the symphonic scores. He returned to these pieces repeatedly in later years, transcribing them for other instruments and for orchestra, as he did with much of his output. The writing is characteristic: a modal melody of folk cut set against a thick, late-Romantic piano texture, with irregular Bulgarian metre appearing unannounced. Vladigerov spent his formative years in Berlin and never separated that training from the material he brought to it.