Dimitar Nenov

Who was Dimitar Nenov?

Dimitar Nenov, was a Bulgarian classical pianist, composer, music pedagogue and architect. He studied music and architecture in Dresden; he also studied with the noted pianist Egon Petri. Nenov went on to become a professor of piano at the Sofia Conservatoire, where he taught piano to the Bulgarian pianists Genko Genov, Svetla Protich, Lazar Nikolov, Trifon Silyanovski, and many others.

A communist regime was installed in Bulgaria on September 9, 1944, a date that marked the end of World War II in Bulgaria. It was tough time then for Bulgarian culture. Prof. Nenov was fired abruptly from the Conservatoire, due to allegations of "having performed piano compositions by 'Nazi' composer Richard Wagner". Following a strong public outcry, he was reluctantly restored back to his position.

In 1953, when Prof. Nenov was already very sick and dying, one of his rivals- a communist protégé- was appointed to Director of the Bulgarian National Radio, and soon afterwards he ordered to have all of Prof. Nenov's musical recordings erased and destroyed. Because of such ruthless hate crime that remained unpunished, only one single live recording of Prof. Nenov remains available today, in the archives of the Hungarian National Radio.