Every year during the second half of March the town of Rousse welcomes elitist Bulgarian and foreign musicians from different places of the world who come to visit and participate in one of the oldest international music festivals in Bulgaria - March Music Days. For 46 years the festival, which was founded in 1961 as an initiative within the frames of the Bulgarian-German cultural cooperation, has been hosted by the Municipality of Rousse and has kept the reputation of the town as one of the leading cultural centers.
Since its foundation until today the festival's realization has engaged a wide circle of national and international institutions such as the Ministry of Culture, the Union of the Bulgarian composers, Bulgarian National Radio, Bulgarian National Television, and more recently British Council, Goethe Institut, Gaudeamus Foundation - Holland, Pro Helvetia, Hungarian Cultural Institute, the Embassy of Austria in Bulgaria, and the Institut Francais – Sofia among others. Thanks to this wide network of institutions the festival has always been a significant and distinct part of the national cultural process and the international prestige of Bulgaria in the field of culture and art.
The long historical record of the festival has listed hundreds of new Bulgarian and foreign premieres, a number of opuses specially composed for the festival as well as numerous remarkable visits and lasting artistic contacts. Thanks to them the festival has kept its reputation as an important center of contemporary Bulgarian and West-European music. One of the most memorable dates in the festival's history is related to Dimitry Shostakovich's visit in 1965 when the premiere of his Katerina Izmailova staged by the Rousse Opera Theatre turned into one of the great cultural events in Bulgaria and the region.
The festival has played host to a number of celebrated performers and orchestras such as S. Richter, K. Masur, G. Rozhdestvensky, V. Neuman, Y. Temirkanov, C. Stria, Y. Konta, D. Kitaenko, M. Ermler, M. Homitser, I. Oistrah, V. Repin, R. Barshai, S. Sondezkis, V. May, S. Costa, M. Kliegel, R. Cohen, M. Stockhausen, F. M. Uitti, K. Orbelian, J. Kenny, Y. Bashmet, G. Kremer, Gewandhaus Orchestra, Berliner Radio Orchestra and Choir, Bucharest Philharmonic, Bucharest Radio Symphony

Orchestra, Moscow Radio and Television Symphony Orchestra, Moscow State Symphony Orchestra, Saint-Petersburg Philharmonic, Philharmonic Katovice, Lithuanian Philharmonic, Lithuanian Chamber Orchestra, Hungarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, Bruckner Orchestra – Linz, London Young Musicians Symphony Orchestra, De Volharding, MusikFabrik, Moscow Soloists, Moscow Chamber Orchestra, Amadinda percussion group, Keller String Quartet, Juilliard String Quartet, and Tokyo String Quartet among others.
Leading Bulgarian orchestras and musicians such as the Sofia Philharmonic, the Bulgarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, Sofia Soloists, E. Tabakov, M. Minchev, V. Milanova, G. Badev, B. Noev, A. Tomova – Sintov, G. Dimitrov, S. Roussev, V. Vassilev, M. Prinz, and N. Todorov among others have been regular participants within the frames of the festival programme.
Over the years the music institutions in Rousse: Rousse Opera-Philharmonic Society, Dunavsky Zvutsy and Prof. Vassil Arnaudov mixed choirs, whose artistic productions have always been featured as unique artistic facts, have also made an extraordinary contribution to the rich festival tradition.
Having this remarkable tradition as a background, the festival today is being developed as an open, dynamic form of culture, as an universal space for contacts and exchange among different cultures and nationalities thus integrating diverse forms of contemporary artistic facts: concerts /symphonic, oratorio and chamber music/, International Music Academy for improvement of young musicians' skills named after prof. Sasha Popov, workshops, conferences, exhibitions, contemporary art.
The festival's recent orientation towards some current trends in the development of the European festival practice, related to the awareness of the festival activity as a global cultural product/process which is open in a democratic way towards various layers and forms of the contemporary culture, has broadened and enriched the festival's artistic profile and social effectiveness.
Since 2005 March Music Days International Festival has become a member of the European Festivals Association /EFA/.

                                                              Iva Chavdarova
                                                              Director of the Festival