Zhivka Klinkova

Zhivka Klinkova was born in Samokov, Bulgaria on 30 July 1924. She attended the Sofia Academy of Music, where she was taught composition by Parashkev Hadjiev and piano by Dimitar Nenov. She graduated from the academy in 1951, then continued her studies with Rudolf Wagner-Régeny and Boris Blacher at the Berlin Hochschule für Musik.^[2]

After she graduated from the academy she began work as a conductor with the state-sponsored Kutev Folkloric Folksong and Dance Company,^[3] and she became the only female orchestral director of a professional Bulgarian folk group. She also composed works for the group's repertoire and worked there until 1960.^[3][4] She subsequently, she travelled to Germany to study,^[3] and was taught by Rudolf Wagner-Régeny from 1960 to 1966 and then by Boris Blacher in Berlin from 1966 to 1968. After she finished her studies, she began work as a freelance composer and wrote ballets, opera and a musical, and a majority of them were performed in Czechoslovakia and Germany. Klinkova's works were inspired by Bulgarian folk music yet contained contemporary themes, such as racial oppression in Quenny, the Little Negro and comparing the world of fairies in her ballet Than saen ("Vietnamese Poem") to the war-torn Vietnam.^[2]

In 1953, Klinkova was selected to be the laureate of the World Festival of Youth and Students which was being held in Bucharest. In 1981, she was awarded a diploma by Pope John Paul II in recognition of her opera Cyril and Methodius, a copy of which is held in the Vatican.^[1]

Klinkova wrote the opera-ballet Olimpijski ustrem, Sănjat na Kuberten to celebrate the 1996 Summer Olympics held in Atlanta, Georgia.^[1]