A pianist and conductor with a world-class career, Ivan Yanakov has been performing on several continents for decades. He has played as a soloist with prestigious orchestras in famous halls, such as New York's Carnegie Hall or London's Cadogan Hall.

Born in Sofia, he graduated from the National Academy of Music "Lyubomir Pipkov", and then went to New York, where he received a master's degree at Mannes College of Music. He also specialized at the famous Italian academy "Chigiana" in Siena. He made his debut as a conductor in 2010 with the Czech National Symphony Orchestra. In 2011, he founded the youth chamber ensemble London Chamber Players in London. Yanakov often leads master classes in Europe and Asia, and is co-founder and musical director of the Siena Belcanto festival in Italy and the Irvine Chamber Music Festival in California.

We meet at the House Museum “Pancho Vladigerov” in Sofia a day before the final of his master class, which is not his first. Last year, Yanakov was very pleased with the young people he worked with here and this time he is happy again because the pianists are very well prepared.

Many of the Bulgarian musicians who have found their realisation around the world already seem to want to return. Ivan Yanakov himself said something similar a few years ago, during the pandemic. I ask if he is of the same opinion now. "Of course! No matter how negative and nihilistic we are, many good things are happening in Bulgaria and I think there are good prerequisites for living here... Bulgaria could be a base from which one can travel everywhere. In our profession, almost no one stays in one place anymore. Even the orchestras are constantly travelling somewhere, soloists or professors from the academies too." So, it seem he likes it in Bulgaria?

"Naturally! It has become very good to live here, in my opinion. As I told you, regardless of how people complain, in Bulgaria there are very good prerequisites for a good life."

Yanakov knows that for the past ten years many Bulgarians have returned to their homeland: "I'm not talking about musicians but about all kinds of professions. There are people who have studied around the world and who start businesses. This is like after the Liberation - the 1870s, the 1880s and the beginning of the 20th century, when many Bulgarians went to study abroad: in Switzerland, in France, in America, England, Russia, Germany, Austria, and all of them at one point returned home with their knowledge. That's why if we look at Bulgarian society between the 1920s and 1950s (of the 20th century), it had a very strong intelligentsia and specialists in many fields."

"Of course, things are not perfect, but they are perfect nowhere at the moment. Here at least there is an atmosphere of improvement and I think things are getting better. Look at the Philharmonic and the soloists it already has! Look at the Music Academy and its rector who works so hard for it, to have new instruments, to have new working conditions... These are some magnificent directors at the moment, who are doing a lot. They leave behind a serious base and some new principles that are yet to be evaluated and implemented in musical institutions."

His family story in an interesting one. "Coincidentally, both of my grandmothers are from Burgas, but from completely different origins. The father of one of my grandmothers was the first lawyer in the city. Speaking of studying abroad and returning - he studied in Switzerland and returned. My great-grandfather was the mayor of Ruse at the end of the 19th century. Also, my great-grandfather - on my father's side, was the mayor of Plovdiv in the 1920s. And we have many musicians from all branches of the family. My father was a very good singer - bass-baritone. He had studied with Brambarov - one of the best teachers in Bulgaria. My mother is a piano teacher."

"I have always been lucky with very good teachers," Yanakov says. "My private teacher was Mayer Frank, thanks to whom I actually have technical knowledge of the instrument. While I lived in the USA, I also had wonderful teachers - for example, Arkady Aronov. My professors in polyphony, harmony, music history, art history in the USA were people with a huge general culture. They had traveled, graduated in different places and taught me things that were not taught in Bulgaria."

Ivan Yanakov also travels all over the world. When we ask if there is a place he has not played yet, he says that he has not been to South America yet and that this continent is his dream. On the other hand, seven years ago he had recitals in Australia - in Melbourne and Sydney. He has a serious program in the coming months. He will actively study new repertoire in the summer, because there are a series of important performances planned in Bulgaria. He will perform Rachmaninoff's Piano Concerto No. 3 with the Sofia Philharmonic in the autumn of 2025.

He is pleased to share about the performance of the big band version of Gershwin's "Rhapsody in Blue", which will be realised with Antoni Donchev and the Big Band of the Bulgarian National Radio.

What is his biggest dream? Ivan thinks about it, then says that there are many! Ivan Yanakov dreams of "having the freedom to do whatever he wants with music, whenever and wherever he wants".

Publication in English: Al. Markov

Photos: Ivan Yanakov’s personal archive