Krassimira Stoyanova

Krassimira Stoyanova In Recital At The 45th March Music Days
Rousse, Bulgaria, 24 March 2005

Her occasional home-coming always turns into a music event in her native Bulgaria. This time Krassimira Stoyanova appeared at the Rousse March Music days in a recital including twenty melodies and songs by opera composers: Gounod, Donizetti, Puccini in the first part and Tchaikovsky and Rahmaninov in the second plus two "encores" by Bulgarian composers Dobri Hristov and Liubomir Pipkov. She performed this same recital at Carnegie Hall on January 18, 2005, accompanied by Yelena Kurdina.

French and Italian opera repertoire is the strong point of this fine Bulgarian soprano who, since 1999, has been a regular at the Vienna National opera on which stage Stoyanova can be seen between April 2 and May, 16 in "La Bohème," "Simone Boccanegra," "Falstaff" and "Les Contes d'Hoffman."

Krassimira Stoyanova is a "sparkly" performer who "catches" the audience from the beginning, making it experience all the drama of the works. From the most dramatic fullness of sorrow and despair like Donizetti's "La mère et l'enfant" through Gounod's "A une jeune fille," Tchaikovsky's "Ni slovo, o moi drug," "Snovo kak prezhde, odin" and Rachmaninov's "Poliubila ya pechal svoiu," "Ne poi krassavitsa..." to the radiant "Ma belle rebelle" et "Venise" (Gounod), Puccini's baroque-like "Salve Regina," "Terra e mare," "Storiella d'amore," "Sole e amore" and Rachmaninov's "Vessennie void," Stoyanova suggests all the range of emotions with her moving vibrato, lighter in the French melodies and darker in the rest of the songs, large amplitude and subtlety of singing. Some Russian performers could take lessons from her approach to Tchaikovsky and Rachmaninov: dynamic phrasing, clear diction, observed measure of emotion, sincerity and naturalness, as well as pleasure of singing. Both Donizeti's songs "La Sultana" and "Ah! Rammenta o bella Irene" (genuine arias), Rachmaninov's "Ne poi krassavitsa..." and all five Tchaikovsky's songs were of her best. On the other hand, the variety of the program and, perhaps, because of some problems with the acoustics, some vowels in the French melodies seemed lacking in control of pronunciation.

Both Bulgarian "encores" "Devoiche" by Dobri Hristov and "Lullaby" by Liubomir Pipkov were polar opposites from the point of view of dynamics of phrasing and emotions. The first one was performed with much humor and vitality that thrilled the audience; and the second with great control of the voice and heavenly floated pianissimi.

Maria Prinz was an expressive and careful accompanist who demonstrated a good knowledge of all the three different styles of music, although sometimes her tone sounded a bit loud and hard perhaps due to the peculiarity of the acoustics. Nevertheless, this evening was a great experience for both performers and audience at Rousse, Bulgaria.