“..one who bears watching by anyone who cares about the future of music.”

- Chicago Tribune

Rossen Milanov’s place as “one of the most-promising figures in the upcoming generation of conductors” (The Seattle Times, February 2009) has recently been recognized with his appointment as music director of The Princeton Symphony Orchestra. In addition, this season he makes a series of international debuts including National Symphony Orchestra, Washington, Rochester Philharmonic, Hyogo Symphony, Japan, the Guangzhou Symphony Orchestra, and China Philharmonic. And he continues to serve as Artistic Director of The Philadelphia Orchestra at The Mann Center for the Performing Arts

A committed supporter of youth and music, Milanov is Music Director of both the New Symphony Orchestra, a privately-funded youth orchestra in his native city of Sofia, Bulgaria, and Symphony In C, one of the USA’s leading professional training orchestras. With The Curtis Institute he conducts one production per season, most recently Argento’s Postcard from Morocco (released on CD); and this season he returns to Carnegie Hall for LinkUP!, a programme supported and promoted by The Weill Music Institute. He has led a tour with the Australian Youth Orchestra, concerts with the Aspen Chamber Symphony and was Music Director of the Chicago Youth Symphony from 1997 to 2001.

A well-known figure in North America, this season Milanov returns to San Antonio Symphony, Milwaukee Symphony and has recently led subscription concerts with the Baltimore, Indianapolis, Seattle, Charlotte and New Jersey Symphony Orchestras. Other re-invitations for this season include Royal Scottish National Orchestra, NHK Symphony Orchestra and the Orchestra of Royal Swedish Opera. He has also worked with the BBC Symphony Orchestra, the Scottish Chamber Orchestra, The Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, the Orchestra of St. Luke’s, the Rotterdam Philharmonic, the Orchestra of Komische Oper, Berlin, Orchestre de la Suisse Romande, Singapore Symphony Orchestra, and works regularly with the Seoul Philharmonic Orchestra.

His ongoing relationship with The Philadelphia Orchestra has included critically acclaimed concerts at the orchestra’s summer series at Mann Center, at the Bravo! Vale Valley Music Festival and in subscription concerts at Kimmel Center, including performances of Adams’s Violin Concerto with Leila Josefowicz, Saint-Saëns’s Cello Concerto with Yo-Yo Ma, Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 15 and the world premiere of Nicholas Maw’s English Horn Concerto.

As an opera conductor, Rossen Milanov’s recent performances of La bohème with the Philadelphia Orchestra both at Mann Center and at Bravo! were received with critical acclaim. He has worked with the legendary Bulgarian bass Nikolai Ghiaurov; and in 2008, as Chief Conductor of the Bulgarian National Radio Orchestra, led the orchestra in a European tour featuring the international star mezzo-soprano Vesselina Kasarova.

His recording of works by the Russian composer Alla Pavlova with the Moscow Philharmonic is available on the Naxos label; and a live performance of Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 15 is available though Philadelphia Online.

Mr Milanov studied conducting at the Juilliard School (where he received the Bruno Walter Memorial Scholarship), the Curtis Institute of Music, Duquesne University and the Bulgarian National Academy of Music. He has received the Award for Extraordinary Contribution to Bulgarian Culture, awarded by the Bulgarian Ministry of Culture, and in 2005 was chosen as Bulgaria’s Musician of the Year.

2009/10 season. Please contact HarrisonParrott if you wish to edit this biography.
Photo credit: Ed Wheeler / The Philadelphia Orchestra Association