Baritone Konstantin Rittel fell in love with Bulgaria after his Plovdiv debut

Konstantin Rittel-Kobylianski is a Ukrainian-German opera singer, born in 1975 into a family of actors in Kyiv, the capital of Ukraine. His maternal great-grandfather was the brother of renowned Ukrainian writer Olga Kobylianska (1863–1942).

He received his first degree from the National Pedagogical Dragomanov University in Kyiv and graduated in opera singing from the Odesсa National A. V. Nezhdanova Academy of Music in 1998. From 2000 to 2003, he studied at the Hochschule für Musik Freiburg in Germany and took part in masterclasses, including one led by one of the greatest opera singers of the 20th century, Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau.

He has received the prestigious International Music and Theatre Award in Germany, as well as the Pro Europe - European Foundation for Culture Award, presented by the European Foundation for Culture under the auspices of the European Parliament in Strasbourg. He has performed in Paris, Strasbourg, Amsterdam, Rotterdam, Marseille, Moscow, St Petersburg, Kyiv, Odesa, Chicago, Santa Barbara, San Francisco, Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, Berlin and many other cities. His repertoire includes dozens of iconic baritone roles.

On August 28, 2026, as part of the Opera Open Festival at the Ancient Theatre in Plovdiv, organised every summer by the Plovdiv Opera, Konstantin Rittel made his Bulgarian debut as Escamillo in Bizet's Carmen, a role for which he received the German International Music and Theatre Award. He has performed Escamillo many times at different theatres and considers it one of his favourite roles. He was delighted to accept the invitation from Plovdiv because:

"First of all, this is the birthplace of great musicians. First and foremost, Boris Christoff, the greatest bass. I was lucky that my first rehearsal took place in a kind of Palace of Music named after him. And in front of the building there is a monument, like a mask, which looks very much like him in real life. I was fortunate enough to see him once when I was very young. My mother knew him. And this is not my own line, but hers. She once said: 'My God, how wisely time has arranged things! How it placed two great geniuses, Chaliapin and Christoff, at different times, because otherwise the audience would not have been able to choose. There would have been two gods in the operatic firmament.'"

For him, visiting a unique place such as Plovdiv, the oldest continuously inhabited city in Europe, was an extraordinary experience.

"You know, the only place where I haven't sung is the North Pole, among the bears, but the audience in Plovdiv is something special. My God, there were so many young people! I'll tell you from personal experience: I am from Kyiv, I grew up there, and those cobblestone streets, which, unfortunately, have all been replaced by ordinary asphalt in Kyiv, you have preserved here in your wonderfully beautiful city. You have preserved the spirit of the past, and that means a great deal to me. In Plovdiv I felt as if I were in old Kyiv, in Podil, in Pechersk. These are very old parts of the city, which have still been preserved. But Plovdiv has preserved all this in a truly magnificent way. It is all thanks to your hearts. The people of this city are incredible. The most important thing is the wonderful atmosphere, the inspiration..."

Konstantin says he has felt like an artist since birth. But his first ambition was to become... a street cleaner.

"I was a good student at school, I adored literature, I took part in amateur theatre, I enjoyed the drama club and, in general, I wanted to be a character actor. The only thing that stood in my way was my physique. I am 1.94 metres tall, with dark hair, basically the build of a hero. But I always wanted to play Baba Yaga, a troll, an ugly forest spirit, a madman, a homeless man. Those are the roles for me, because they are character roles and they are interesting."

After he graduated from school, his uncle, whom he loved dearly, told him: "Why do you want to be an artist? You will be poor. All artists are poor. Become a teacher. They have increased teachers' salaries." And so he enrolled at a pedagogical institute.

In the end, however, singing won out. Konstantin Rittel has now lived in Germany for almost 30 years.

"I was very lucky. I was surrounded by people who were thousands of times more talented than me. Then you develop one essential trait: you constantly see what is wrong. In practice, I never leave a concert or performance with a satisfied look on my face. There are many things I don't like, especially in my own work."

He is deeply grateful to the chorus singers and extras in the Plovdiv production of Carmen, who readily adapted the staging to accommodate his interpretation of the bullfighter Escamillo.

He has sung throughout Europe and America, but considers the Israeli audience extraordinary, stunningly warm and very similar to the Bulgarian audience. His plans for the near future include concerts in Cyprus and Israel, as well as a tour of North America. Personally, I will look forward to welcoming him back to Bulgaria.

What would you like people around the world to know about Bulgaria?

"I want to tell the whole world that there is a wonderful, marvellous country. If I wanted to tell the world something, I would say: this is an extraordinary people, and you feel like wishing them to remain. I do not want to wish you anything more. Precisely to Bulgaria I wish that you remain so extraordinary, so bright. Well, the word 'pure' or 'untouched' is probably not the right one... You see, perhaps we should even learn from Bulgaria how, in this insane, mad, frantically forward-moving world... In Bulgaria I felt something... It was as if the people here were calming me down in a beautiful way. I felt that these people, you, know how to derive something from relatively ordinary human feelings... Well, there is sentiment in this life. Not this 'tick-tock', where everything has to function like a machine. That is what people here possess."

Perhaps you are talking about the pace of life, which is somewhat slower here?

"Yes, it is a rhythm, but it is driven by warmth, genuine warmth, not simply by the kind of warmth shown when someone wants something from someone else. It is unconditional... Everyone here is wonderful. But besides my love for the country, the fact that there were so many young people at our performance is remarkable. This is rare in many countries, where the audience is older. I was amazed. I kept saying to myself: 'My God, how wonderful, so many young people, they are the future!' It is impressive, it is inspiring. So be happy and remain just as wonderful and warm-hearted. Long live my now beloved Bulgaria!"

English version: R. Petkova