Archive Funds

Simo Leonov Lazarov was born on March 9, 1948 in Sofia, in a family of intellectuals with a strong interest in the art of music. From the age of five he studied solfeggio and took his first accordion and piano lessons. As a student Simo Lazarov participated in orchestral ensembles and groups, playing various instruments in various styles. His other hobby - technology - took him in 1966 to the Prague Polytechnic, and later to the Technical University in Sofia, where in 1973 he completed his higher education with a thesis on "Polyphonic organ in transistor design." In the same year he started working at the Bulgarian National Radio as a sound engineer and developing the rare combination of music and technology at that time, he created the first in Bulgaria Studio for electronic music, run by him until 1999.

He specialized in electronic, electroacoustic and computer music in the world's leading studios and centers in Prague, Bratislava, Paris and Michigan, learning about innovations in these areas. The studio activity is a field for constant experiments for Simo Lazarov, and the result of this work are the realized numerous sound projects - author's and other musicians. Lazarov is an active promoter of electronic music in Bulgaria - author and participant in hundreds of radio and television programs, attracting musicians, composers, engineers, directors, journalists and writers, sympathetic to his ideas for creating contemporary music. The merit of Simo Lazarov for the spread of electronic music in Bulgaria is indisputable - for several decades he has been on the stage as a musician, organizer of various music projects and composer.

The scientific and pedagogical works (9 monographs, nearly 60 studies and articles) created by Simo Lazarov in the field of electronic and computer music, as well as the specialized curricula are of fundamental importance for the establishment and quality growth of Bulgarian electronic and computer music.

Since 1977 the teaching and pedagogical activity of Simo Lazarov has passed with the courses in sound engineering, sound engineering, sound culture and electronic music through the Academy of Music, the Technical and Sofia University, through many summer schools in Bulgaria and abroad to initiate and create according to his own methodology a special class in 1996 at the New Bulgarian University, which is the only specialization in computer music making in Bulgaria.

At the beginning of 2018 Prof. Lazarov donated his archival materials to the New Bulgarian University.

The donated collection contains dozens of diplomas, certificates and congratulatory addresses, which Prof. Lazarov received in recognition of his many years of creative, scientific and teaching work - one of the later is the diploma from his announcement as Honorary Professor of New Bulgarian University on May 21, 2015.

Materials from his scientific and creative work are the manuscripts of some of his papers, such as "Musical means of sound (Advantages and disadvantages. Psychological attitude. Perception of music)" and "Composition made by computer" - both papers were written for the conference "Acoustics, 1978" at the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences, "Sound Processing" - a report prepared for a conference in the Institut de Recherché et Coordination Acoustique / Musique in Paris in 1981, "Computer Music" - a report, part of which was published in 1985 in the magazine "Youth", "Electronic means of expression in the classical music" - report for a conference in Gif-sur-Yvette (Paris, France) in 1986. Here are the manuscripts of books prepared by him such as "Electronics. Music. Computers (1988) and Computers and Music" (1989 - co-authored with Emil Lazarov), as well as the article "Maestro computer is looking for new sounds", published in 1979.

There is also the abstract of Simo Lazarov on his dissertation "Use of microcomputer systems for creative realization in the composition and performance of electronic and computer music" from 1990.

A rare edition - "Trinity of the team" by Miroslav Mraz, printed in cyclostyle in 1978 in the series "Training and Qualification of Personnel" of the Bulgarian National Radio, presents Prof. Simo Lazarov as a translator from Czech into Bulgarian.

The collection of illustrative materials is very rich. There are original and digitized photographs by Prof. Simo Lazarov, tracing his life, actively connected with music from his school years until today. Important for the history of Bulgarian music are the photographs that captured the atmosphere in the Studio for Electronic Music at the Bulgarian National Radio, which shows its founder Simo Lazarov and his colleagues. Carriers of valuable information are the many photographs, posters, invitations and programs from concerts and mega performances of Simo Lazarov, as well as those documenting the festivals for electronic music, which Prof. Lazarov is the organizer.

The collection of audio-visual materials, which Prof. Lazarov has carefully preserved over the years and are now part of the collections of the University Archives of NBU, is also impressive. Singles, long-playing records, audio cassettes, CDs and audio files cover the hard-to-see musical work of Prof. Lazarov, and the video files reflect nearly 600 recorded events with the participation of the "father of electronic music" in our country from 1965 to 2018.