For me, it is a huge event to be at the Sofia Opera and a real pleasure to finally sing "La Bohème" in Bulgaria. This is what opera singer Sonia Yoncheva said at a press conference at the Sofia Opera and Ballet, BGNES reported.
Yoncheva, who was yesterday awarded the "Officer of the Order of Arts and Letters" award of France for her significant contribution to the spread of French culture and art worldwide, said that she wants the future of Bulgarian opera to be secured.
Apart from singing, she shared that she is a big fan of the human voice. "My career started because I fell in love with a singer's voice. This love of mine for the sound, for the timbre of the human voice, led me to the idea of making this season, because it is missing on the Bulgarian stage", said the opera singer, who adores music in all its aspects, and will delight the Bulgarian audience at the Sofia Opera and Ballet with his special participation in the Gala performances "La Bohème", an opera by Giacomo Puccini, from February 29 to March 2.
For her, music is the art that manages to name all these states, to penetrate our psychology in such a way that we need words. "When a person feels the need to express himself and with all his emotional baggage can convey this, I don't see why there should be boundaries between different styles," Yoncheva said.
The opera singer announced that she will present the "Singing Actress" project in Germany with music from films from the 1930s, revealing that a song from the Bulgarian cinema - "Be quiet" is also included.
"I don't fight against success. I let it come when it's time and I've accepted it like a bouquet of flowers. I'm happy when things are achieved easily, when everyone is happy and above all when the audience is happy", she emphasized and added that she never saw success as her own, because it belongs to everyone who works with her .
Yoncheva noted that she is a great defender of the Bulgarian opera and it has always been a privilege for her to say that she is Bulgarian.
When asked what she wanted to say with her Mimi, the character the opera singer will play, she replied that it was a role that came into her life on the spur of the moment. "I made my debut before anything was expected. I felt all the vibrations of this little, sweet, gentle soul. I've always wondered if we should just feel sorry for her or admire her. She is the only character who stands up with her last strength and tells the truth," added Yoncheva and added that she will not try to impress the audience with anything, but will be as honest as possible with her.
The opera singer said that she admires all these voices that have left such a big mark not only on the Bulgarian, but also on the world sky, saying that it gives her great pleasure to see and hear that Bulgaria is on the world map.
Yoncheva also commented on the challenges that an opera performer can face. "When a huge voice with a lot of capacity comes on the market, everyone jumps on it, offers start pouring in for all kinds of roles. Many directors do not have the musical training to take on a voice, to take care of it. On the other hand, singers, especially when they're young, are terribly impatient," she explained.
The opera singer shared that she was lucky to meet people who gave her good advice. One of these tips is that in this profession you have to learn patience. "I have never allowed myself to bully this instrument that lives in my body," she also stated, specifying that she was always very aware of her capabilities.
When asked by BGNES why it is important to introduce children to art and how it builds characters and personalities, Yoncheva, who is the mother of two children, aged 4 and 9, answered that music is important for children for two reasons: The first is because music for me is really this spiritual world, this world of our psyche that we cannot name with our words. This world is extremely important because everything that goes on in our heads actually reflects who we are as people."
According to her, for small children who have a very vague understanding of their emotions and hardly know what it means to love too much or hate too much, they don't even know how to name these things, but they feel them, music has exactly that aim , precisely this power – to name the emotions and for us to understand them with even greater power within us.
The opera singer said that she recently had an interesting conversation with the principal of the school where her son studies. The principal asked for her perspective on what could be done better so that students would not see a psychologist as often. "You, do you understand that this is a huge phenomenon - in Western Europe, in the whole world, most likely in Bulgaria as well, I am sure that there are people who do not know exactly how to help their children and send them to someone else to make this attempt. The very contact with music, the very discipline that music imposes - the development of the ear, the development of small details, the happening in a text, they contribute so much to the psychology of a child," she pointed out.
Yoncheva added that music teaches children to be, to unite with others, to love each other, to avoid aggressiveness. "Music is something that can only teach us," she is emphatic.
When asked by BGNES whether art is paid enough attention in Bulgaria, whether culture is at all on the agenda for Bulgarian politicians, the opera singer commented that when she was a child, music and the arts were perhaps 30% of what they studied then . For Yoncheva, who grew up in a suburb of Plovdiv, these were the hours in which she could really give freedom to who she is, to her personality and character. "Children are looking for this freedom everywhere, and it doesn't come with pills and psychologists, it comes precisely with the arts," she said and concluded that her goal is to develop young people as much as possible through art. /BGNES
