SVETLIN RОUSSEV‘s brilliant career unfolded after winning First Prize in 2001 at the First International Competition in Sendai, where he also received the Audience Award for the best performance of Bach. The charismatic virtuoso has toured to some of the greatest concert halls – the Tchaikovsky and Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow, Suntory Hall in Tokyo, the Seoul Arts Centre, the Playel, UNESCO, the Théâtre des Champs-Elysées and the Théâtre du Châtelet, “Cité de la Musique and Théâtre de la Ville in Paris, the Béla Bartók in Budapest, the Alte Oper in Frankfurt, the Konzerthaus in Berlin, the Kirchner Cultural Centre in Buenos Aires, the Palais des Beaux-Arts in Brussels and the UN Palais in Geneva.
He is a regular soloist of the Orchestre National de France, the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande, the Orchestre National de Belgique, the Seoul and Tokyo Philharmonics, the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra, the George Enescu Philharmonic Orchestra (Bucharest), the Romanian National Radio Orchestra, Kremerata Baltica, the Bulgarian National Radio Orchestra, etc. In the USA, Latin America, Asia and Europe, has performed under the baton of renowned conductors such as Myung-whun Chung, Leon Fleisher, Yehudi Menuhin, Yuzo Toyama, Marek Janowski, Emmanuel Krivinе, François-Xavier Roth, Jean-Jacques Кantorow, Dennis Russell Davies, Lionel Bringuier, Emil Tabakov, Nayden Todorov and others.
Since 2000 Svetlin Roussev has led and conducted various ensembles and orchestras in Bulgaria, France, Poland, South Korea, Japan and Sweden.
As a chamber musician, he has partnered musicians in the class of Myung-whun Chung, Jean-Yves Thibaudet, Yeol Eum Son, Peter Frankl, Ralf Gothóni, Jean-Marc Luisada, Bertrand Chamayou, Jean-Philippe Collard, Antoine Tamestit, Maxim Rysanov, Gary Hoffman, Gautier Capuçon, Jian Wang, François Leleux, Paul Meier, Nikolaj Znaider and Ning Feng. He is a founding member of the Roussev-Salk-Rozanova piano trio.
His repertoire is extremely wide – from baroque to contemporary music, his interpretations of works by Slavic and Bulgarian composers are widely known. Following the success of a recording of works by Pancho Vladigerov with the pianist Elena Rozanova for the Ambroisie company, he recorded Hartmann’s Concerto funebre with the Auvergne Orchestra and sonatas by Grieg and Mettner with the pianist Frédéric D’Oria-Nicolas, and his album Fire and Ice, featuring the Sibelius and Vladigerov concertos with the Bulgarian National Radio Symphony Orchestra conducted by Emil Tabakov, was released by the French companies Integral and Fondamenta.In 2016 DECCA released his record of the piano trios of Félix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy (No. 1) and Antonin Dvorak (Dumky), made with pianist Elena Rozanova and cellist François Salk. The disc is followed by a new recording of works by E. Isaiah for violin and orchestra (Musique en Wallonie) and Spanish Symphony (Arcantus) by Edward Lalo, under the baton of Jean-Jacques Kantorow. Svetlin Roussev’s latest recording is the album Midnight Bells, made together with the talented pianist Yeol Eum Son (YESM & ART). Most recently, the complete works for violin and orchestra by Tchaikovsky have been released with the Sofia Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Horia Andreescu.
Svetlin Roussev is a professor at the renowned National Supérieur de Musique et de Danse in Paris and gives master classes all over the world. He is the artistic advisor and artist in residence of the International Festival “March Music Days” in Ruse, and has been artistic advisor to the Sofia Philharmonic Orchestra.
He began his musical training from an early age with his mother, a violin teacher at the music school in Ruse, and with Anelia Popova and Alexi Draganov. At the age of 15, he enrolled in the Paris Conservatoire, where he studied with Gerard Poulet, Devi Härli and Jean-Jacques Kantorow. Three years later the jury unanimously awarded him first prizes for violin and chamber music and he subsequently joined the Conservatorire’s Postgraduate Programme.
He has won prizes at the Long-Tibaud International Competition, Indianapolis, Melbourne, etc. He was named Musician of the Year 2006 by the Bulgarian National Radio, and has been awarded the Crystal Lyre three times (2007, 2016 and 2019). In 2018 he was made an Honorary Citizen of Ruse, and in 2019 he received the Honorary Badge of the President of the Republic of Bulgaria.
Svetlin Roussev performs on the Amati-Stradivarius 1720 violin kindly loaned by AMUNDI.