The team of Fortissimo Family has set the task to turn the acquaintance of children with classical music into something pleasant and intriguing. The Bulgaria Hall downtown Sofia fills little curious spectators each month, as theatrical performances take place there – the trade mark of the project. The interest in those is getting bigger. The third season of the initiative proves that. Conductor Maxim Eshkenazi, who lives and works in the USA, is the founder of Fortissimo Family. He transferred his experience with classic music educational programs to Bulgaria and thus the project was given a start. Writer and screenwriter Alexander Chobanov is also on the team, tempted by the music and ideas of Fortissimo Family.

“Our fairy tales have gradually grown into shows”, Chobanov explains. “Maxim Eshkenazi and music editor Svetlana Terzieva prepare the music pieces and I decide what the story will be accordingly. Actors in our shows make the connection between fairy tales and music. It simply wouldn’t work if they don’t have the right approach towards music, but luckily all our formation choices have been successful. I love to see things occurring in the process of work - when we are all on the same wave, the final result is good. After fairytales on different music instruments we finished the last season with a story on the symphonic orchestra and the conductor, we have new proposals now… We get the kids acquainted with composers or music periods by trying to step out of the cliché."

“Teenage concerts are my favorite. The first one of mine was Love Story,” Alexander Chobanov goes on to say. “It is based on Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet. I use my students’ literature knowledge. The music in these shows is more popular and the lyrics accentuate on serious topics – love, hatred, revenge etc. A Knight Story is based on Don Quixote by Cervantes. These theatrical concerts are very well received. In the words of Maxim Eshkenazi we are pioneers in such programs not only in Bulgaria. Teenagers are not an easy audience, they watch reality series. We use that and include famous faces like Mihaela Fileva, Angel Kovachev from the Angel and Moses duo etc. When they come, kids begin to realize there is nothing scary about classical music. Our multimedia project is based on a series, developed by famous American critic Joseph Horowitz, who makes experiments with formats, new to the audience. Last year it watched Dvorak in America and now we will stage A Tchaikovsky Portrait: Child of Glass, for the final days of the composer’s life.”

On February 7 – 8 Fortissimo Family presented a loved show: Fairy Tales on percussions, with the participation of the Noble Drummers Ensemble. Alexander Tsvetkov, who performs with the ensemble, said:

“There is a great interest in the concerts. The kids are curious, they want to know and some of them are prepared in advance on the family of drums. Many of them stay after the end of the show, we let them play a bit… Beatboxer Adriana Nikolova, aka Pechenkata was our partner at the latest concert that we had. We start on a dialogue and we provoke each other, we want the onstage improvisation to be passed on to the kids, giving them an additional emotion. The script is focused on the African continent and that is why besides the traditional drumming instruments we use several typical ones – for instance amadinda, a percussion instrument from Uganda. We also have a jawbone – a music instrument, made of a donkey’s jaw. It is very attractive to kids.”

English version: Zhivko Stanchev