My Homeland — ADDA·SIMFÒNICA ALICANTE, Andrey Baranov (violin), Rossen Milanov (guest conductor)

### Andrey Baranov. Violin

Andrey Baranov won the Queen Sofía International Violin Competition in 2012, as well as the Benjamin Britten and Henri Marteau international competitions, and has received awards at over twenty international competitions, including those in Indianapolis, Seoul, Sendai, Liana Isakadze, David Oistrakh, and the Paganini International Competition in Moscow.

Born in Saint Petersburg in 1986 into a musical family, he began playing the violin at the age of five. He studied at the Rimsky-Korsakov Conservatory in Saint Petersburg and the Lausanne Conservatory under Lev Ivaschenko, Vladimir Ovcharek, and Pierre Amoyal. He has also taken masterclasses with renowned musicians such as Boris Kushnir, Liana Isakadze, and Kim Kashkashian, among others.

Since his major debut in 2005 at the Saint Petersburg Philharmonic Hall with the Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Vasily Petrenko, he has performed on world-renowned stages including Bozar in Brussels, Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, Vienna Konzerthaus, Mozarteum, Cadogan Hall in London, Gewandhaus in Leipzig, Berlin Konzerthaus, Tchaikovsky Hall in Moscow, and again at the Saint Petersburg Philharmonic.

He has appeared as a soloist with prestigious orchestras such as the Royal Philharmonic, Vienna Symphony, Saint Petersburg Philharmonic, Montreal Symphony Orchestra, Liverpool Philharmonic, Mariinsky Theatre Orchestra, Camerata Salzburg, Luxembourg Philharmonic, Brussels Philharmonic, Belgian National Orchestra, Slovak Philharmonic, Mahler Chamber Orchestra, MusicAeterna, Aalborg Symphony, Stuttgart Philharmonic, Sendai Philharmonic, and the SWR Symphony Orchestra from Stuttgart.

He has collaborated with conductors of the caliber of Yuri Temirkanov, Vladimir Fedoseev, Teodor Currentzis, Kent Nagano, Vasily Petrenko, Michael Sanderling, Daniel Raiskin, Nikolai Alekseev, Michel Tabachnik, Walter Weller, Gabriel Bebeselea, Ion Marin, and Emmanuel Krivine, among others.

He has also shared the stage with artists such as Martha Argerich, Eliso Virsaladze, Julian Rachlin, Boris Andrianov, Pierre Amoyal, and Liana Isakadze.

His performances have been broadcast worldwide by radio stations including BR Classic, Radio Orpheus, Espace 2 (Switzerland), YLE Radio (Finland), WFYI and WFMT Chicago (USA), and NHK Sendai (Japan).

Andrey Baranov is also the first violinist of the David Oistrakh Quartet, a critically acclaimed ensemble founded in 2012. They have performed at prestigious festivals and venues including the Paris Philharmonie, Wigmore Hall, Vienna Konzerthaus, Pierre Boulez Saal in Berlin, Prague Spring Festival, Stars on Baikal, Palau de la Música in Valencia, Auditori in Barcelona, Bratislava Festival, Liszt Academy in Budapest, Gulbenkian Foundation, and Dortmund Konzerthaus.

### Rossen Milanov. Guest Conductor

Rossen Milanov is currently Music Director of the Columbus Symphony Orchestra, Princeton Symphony Orchestra, Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra, and Chief Conductor of the RTV Slovenia Symphony Orchestra in Ljubljana. He is respected and admired by both audiences and musicians alike, and has established a prominent presence nationally and internationally as an orchestral conductor.

Previous positions include Music Director of the Bulgarian National Radio Symphony Orchestra, New Symphony Orchestra in Sofia, Symphony in C in New Jersey, and the Principality of Asturias Symphony Orchestra (OSPA) in Spain.

In the United States, he has conducted orchestras including the Colorado, Detroit, Indianapolis, Milwaukee, Baltimore, Seattle, and Fort Worth symphonies, as well as the National Symphony Orchestra at the Kennedy Center. He has worked with Orchestra of St. Luke’s on educational projects with Carnegie Hall, and with the Civic Orchestra of Chicago.

Internationally, he has collaborated with the BBC Symphony, Orchestre de la Suisse Romande, Rotterdam Philharmonic, national orchestras of Latvia, Hungary, and Aalborg, as well as symphony orchestras of Toronto, Vancouver, Mexico, Colombia, São Paulo, Belo Horizonte, and the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra. In Asia, he has conducted NHK, Sapporo, Tokyo, and Singapore symphonies, as well as the Malaysian and Hong Kong philharmonics. He has worked with renowned artists such as Yo-Yo Ma, Itzhak Perlman, Joshua Bell, Renée Fleming, Midori, Hilary Hahn, Dawn Upshaw, and André Watts, among many others. Over eleven years, he conducted over 200 concerts with The Philadelphia Orchestra, served as Music Director of Symphony in C for fifteen years, and led the New Symphony Orchestra in Sofia for seventeen years.

A passionate advocate of contemporary music, he has premiered works by composers including Derek Bermel, Mason Bates, Caroline Shaw, Philip Glass, Richard Danielpour, Nicolas Maw, and Gabriel Prokofiev.

In opera and ballet, he has conducted at Komische Oper Berlin (Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk), Opera Oviedo (Mazeppa, Bluebeard's Castle), and productions at Opera Columbus and The Princeton Festival, where he has also served as Music Director since 2022. In ballet, he has collaborated with the New York City Ballet and choreographers such as Mats Ek, Benjamin Millepied, and Alexei Ratmansky, with whom he co-created an acclaimed production of Swan Lake in Zurich and Paris.

He has received the Arts Award from the Columbus Foundation. In Princeton, he has championed artistic innovation and strong community engagement. Milanov studied conducting at the Bulgarian Musical Academy, Curtis Institute, Tanglewood, and Juilliard, where he was awarded the Bruno Walter Fellowship.

An avid cyclist and cook, he dedicates his culinary talents to charitable causes. He is a former fellow and current board member of the Cyril and Methodius Foundation in Bulgaria.