Bulgarian National Radio Big Band in concert in honour of Milcho Leviev
Bulgarian National Radio Big Band will be in concert in honour of jazz great Milcho Leviev at Sofia Live Club on October 14 at 8pm.
The concert is being held to promote the album “Milcho Leviev – Anti-Waltz – Music for the Big Band”.
Special guests on stage at the event will include Vicky Almazidou (vocals), Mihail Yosifov (trumpet) and Stoyan “Stundzhi” Yankulov (drums).
Jazz numbers by Leviev to be performed include “Blues at 9”, “Blues at 10”, “Studia”, “Anti-Waltz” and “Soup of the Day”, among others.
Plovdiv-born Leviev, who died on October 12 2019, was one of the most famous Bulgarian jazz musicians, a brilliant instrumentalist, composer and arranger.
After his beginnings with the Big Band of Bulgarian National Radio, of which he was the conductor, he left for the United States in 1970 – during Bulgaria’s communist era – where he went on to work on projects with Don Ellis, the Billy Cobham Band, and recorded with John Klemmer, Art Pepper, and Roy Haynes.
Leviev toured the US and Europe, was music director for Lainie Kazan from 1977 to 1980. He toured Europe with Pepper (1980–82) and was one of the founders of the fusion band Free Flight.
In 1983 he became music director of the Jazz Sessions at the Comeback Inn in Venice, California. He gave concerts in Japan with bassist Dave Holland (1983–86) and organised solo jazz recitals in Europe (1985–86). He taught jazz composition at the University of South California and taught master classes at the New Bulgarian University in Sofia. Leviev composed symphony and chamber works, big band, and jazz orchestra music. He also composed wrote film music.
Tickets for the concert, which opens Sofia Live Club’s season, are available at the Advertising and Information Centre of Bulgarian National Radio, 4 Dragan Tsankov Blvd and via eventim.bg.
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