Musicians from Greece, Turkiye and Bulgaria will take part in the 18th International Military Brass Band Festival, to be held in Veliko Tarnovo on September 21 and 22, the organizers said on Tuesday.
The event will bring together on one stage the C-Corps Army Band from Thessaloniki, Greece, the Bursa Uludag Mehter Band from Turkiye, the Representative Brass Band of the Bulgarian Guards Unit – Sofia, and the Maestro Nikolay Kosev Festival Brass Band, which includes musicians from the Vasil Levski National Military University and the Second Mechanized Brigade Tundzha.
The festival is the only one in Bulgaria dedicated to military music and is traditionally held in the days around Bulgaria’s Independence Day (September 22) in Veliko Tarnovo, the city where the country’s first military brass band was formed in 1879 during the election of Prince Alexander I of Battenberg.
The festival will open on September 21 at 5:00 p.m. in front of the Konstantin Kisimov Music and Drama Theatre, with a joint performance conducted by Maestro Tsvetomir Vasilev, following a festive parade along Vasil Levski Street.
On September 22, the bands will join the official Independence Day procession, which traditionally starts from Tsarevets Fortress and ends in the city centre, where each formation will present an individual performance.
During the festival, a commemorative statuette named after the late maestros Nikolay Kosev and Valeri Valev, founders of the International Military Brass Band Festival Foundation, will be awarded. The festival is organized by the Foundation, Veliko Tarnovo Municipality and the Vasil Levski National Military University, under the patronage of the Defence Minister.
/VE/
